
Class 

Book 

Copyright N^. 



Ci2FmiGHT DSPOSm 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

AN ANTHOLOGY ON 
HEROIC DEATH AND IMMORTAL LIFE 



COMPILED BY 

JOHN HAYNES HOLMES 

AND 

LILLIAN BROWNE-OLF 




NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 

1919 






COPTBIGHT, 1919 

By DODD, mead AND COMPANY, Inc. 



K9V ) 8 1919 



VAIL-BALLOU COMPANT 

BINOHAMTOH AND NE« TOMI 



©CI.A535752 



TO THOSE IN EVERY LAND 

WHO MOURN THEIR DEAD 

MARTYRED 

IN THE GREAT WAR 

TfflS BOOK IS REVERENTLY DEDICATED 



From Life to Death! 

An eager breath, 
A battle for the true and good^ 
An agony upon the rood; 

A darkening of the light — 
And night! 

From Death to Life! 
A peace from strife; 
A voyage o'er an ocean wide 
That moves from shore to shore its tide; 
A passing of the night — 
And light! 

J. H, H. 



PREFACE 



The general plan of this Anthology was conceived by me 
in the summer of 1918. It was at this time, it will be re- 
membered, that the menace of the German assault upon the 
West was shaking not merely Europe but the world to its 
foundations; and the tide of misery and horror, incident 
to the gigantic struggle, had mounted to the full. Upper- 
most in all men's minds at that terrific moment, of course, 
was the fate of civilization, and the doom which seemed to 
be falling upon all things deemed precious. Deep down, 
however, beneath this living consciousness of battle and 
siege, of tottering thrones and shaking systems, of revolu- 
tions, turmoils, " chaos and black night," were the agonies 
silently endured by each one of numberless millions of 
human hearts the world around, as they contemplated the 
peril, and soon or late met the loss, of persons who bore 
into the struggle, as husbands, fathers, sons, lovers, all that 
made life worth the living, and victory in the battle a mat- 
ter of concern. John Galsworthy, in Saint's Progress, 
presents a pathetic picture of the sleep of London on any 
night during the period of the War. " Here a mother would 
be whispering the name of her boy . . . and a wife would 
be turning, to stretch out her arms to — no one; ... By 
thousands the bereaved would be tossing, stifling their 
moans; by thousands the ruined would be gazing into the 
dark future. . . ." It is probable that most people felt the 
Great War only in this intense personal way, for most of 

vli 



viii PREFACE 

us, after all, live in the realm not of ideas or institutions 
at all, but of individual human relations. And this feeling 
touched such depths of passion, in such myriads of hearts, 
at the climactic moments of 1918, as never before had been 
equalled in human history. 

For nearly four years, death had been reaping an un- 
imaginable harvest by battle, starvation and disease. In 
these dreadful summer months, the flood of destruction was 
climbing to heights unseen by man in his most dreadful 
dreams of world disaster. Death was become the order of 
the day — untimely death, unnecessary death, horrible 
death! By a slow turning of life, on the axis of the War, 
so to speak, the modern man found the frontage of his 
experience exactly reversed from all that he had ever known, 
or anticipated. By precept, by example, by the inner 
promptings of his own soul, he had been taught to welcome 
life, and use it to the uttermost. Now, however, he saw 
life suddenly engulfed by death, and after-death! What is 
it to die, and to what does dying bring us — these were be- 
come, through the vast cataclysm of universal war, the 
dominant personal questions of the hour ; and to the average 
man, the answer to these questions was more important than 
answers to all the gigantic questions that beset the minds 
of generals, statesmen and philosophers. To find this an- 
swer, would be perhaps to perform an inestimable service 
for the comforting and strengthening of many hearts. And 
where could this answer be more certainly found than in the 
utterances of the great and good in ages past, and of some 
of the humble but very valiant who were living and dying 
greatly at this great moment? It was in this thought that 
the idea of this Anthology was conceived, and work upon 
its pages happily begun. 

On November 11, 1918, came the Armistice, which seemed 
to end the occasion for this book. Work, therefore, was 



PREFACE ix 

halted, in anticipation of the abandonment of the plan. 
Then came the realization that while the Armistice un- 
doubtedly had made the fighting on the battlefield to cease, 
it had worked, and could work, no such miracle upon the 
sorrows, perplexities, and blind despairs which this fighting 
through more than fifty months had accumulated in men's 
hearts. The problem of death and after-death was with us, 
as it had been always. From the moment that Cain felled 
Abel, man has found himself confronted by the black mys- 
tery of dying, of being and not being, of mortality and im- 
mortality. The War, after all, had not created a new 
problem; it had only intensified an old one. It had not 
raised up something which began and ended with itself; on 
the contrary, it had only brought momentarily into the cen- 
tre of the present picture, so to speak, that which had been 
from the beginning, and which would be till the end of time. 
An anthology of heroic death and immortal life, therefore, 
must have a permanent interest and value. It might be 
occasioned, but certainly could not be bounded by, the War. 
So the work was resumed; and now, with the battle long 
since ended, and the fighting done, is presented to those who 
seek comfort and inspiration on these high themes. 

II 

The preparation of an anthology involves a twofold prob- 
lem — that of the selection and the arrangement of material. 

Selection in this case promptly opened up so tremendous 
a task, that it is doubtful if my collaborator and I would 
have had the courage to undertake this book, had we known 
what was before us. The material readily accessible on our 
chosen themes was embarrassingly abundant. That which 
could be made available by systematic research, was prac- 
tically inexhaustible. A volume giving any adequate sur- 
vey of the field would run to many hundreds of pages and 



X PREFACE 

include many thousands of quotations, and even then in- 
volve a rigorous process of elimination. But our intent 
from the beginning was to produce an anthology which 
should be small in compass, conveniently handled and easily 
read, a book to be loved as scripture rather than consulted 
as a dictionary or encyclopedia. We were moved, that is 
to say, by emotional considerations; our desire was to give 
not knowledge so much as inspiration. This end was best 
furthered by the plan adopted by Robert Bridges, in his 
rarely beautiful book. The Spirit of Man, rather than by 
that adopted by E. C. Stedman in his exceedingly useful 
American Anthology — to present not an accumulation but 
a distillation of the ideas which have been characteristic of 
the highest thought of man on the mysteries of death and 
life eternal. Such a purpose vastly increased the difficulty 
of our task, for even the essence extracted was more than 
could be contained in our chosen vessel. Therefore were 
we driven to a process of selection which was not only rigor- 
ous but in some cases arbitrary, and not always satisfac- 
tory to ourselves. 

Our first task was to gather the passages which were to 
comprise the content of the Anthology. In doing this, we 
did not attempt to cover the field. We simply entered those 
areas which were familiar to ourselves, and garnered what 
we knew or felt to be precious. Even so, we found in our 
hands, when the work was done, more material than we 
could possibly use in accordance with our plans. This 
meant a winnowing which resulted in the rejection of nearly 
a third of all that we had originally collected. These pass- 
ages were perfectly good in themselves, but they repre- 
sented an overflow which we could not handle. 

The standards which we employed in this process of 
selection, are three in number. 

(1) First of all, in the case of each particular quotation, 



PREFACE xi 

was the consideration of its aptness as an expression of the 
ideals of heroic death and immortal life. These ideals we 
had deliberately chosen to be the keynotes of our An- 
thology, and we were insistent that everything should be in 
harmony therewith. Many passages, beautiful in them- 
selves and unquestionably inspiring, were cast aside be- 
cause they did not embody the exact conceptions which we 
had in mind. 

(2) Secondly, there was the question of the literary qual- 
ity of our material. This we desired, and in most cases 
insisted, should be of the highest. Some passages were 
finally admitted to our pages which are devoid of literary 
distinction or beauty, because they give important expres- 
sion to our chosen themes through association with great 
names or epochs of history. These, however, are excep- 
tions, and are few in number. The bulk of the material in 
this volume constitutes what we, at least, regard as liter- 
ature. 

(3) Lastly, there was that indefinite, intangible question 
of tone, or attitude, which my collaborator and I regarded 
as in some ways the most important of all our standards. 
Through much of the writing that has to do with death and 
immortality there runs the taint of insipidity. In every 
collection of material on these subjects which I personally 
have seen — and as a clergyman I have seen, and used, a 
good many ! — the prevailing note is at the best that of 
intelligent piety, and at the worst that of mawkish senti- 
mentality. In this field, if in none other, the sanctimonious 
Sunday School literature of two or three generations ago, 
is still with us. Such maudlin stuff we have sought abso- 
lutely to avoid. Through this Anthology, like fresh breezes 
from the "hills whence cometh (our) strength," there blow, 
we trust, the winds of courage and acclaim. Robustness, 
virility, heroic cheer, tenderness not inconsistent with valour. 



xii PREFACE 

high vision controlled by reason and suffused with poetry — 
this is the note, or attitude, which we have desired that the 
material in this book should invariably express. Our An- 
thology will fulfil no small part of its purpose, if it teaches 
its readers that the atmosphere of death may be as healthful 
as that of life. 

Our quotations selected, there came a further application 
of the sifting process in the problem of what part, or parts, 
of each particular quotation, we should use. Again with 
the idea of confining our material within the smallest pos- 
sible space, we have reproduced from our various sources 
of prose and poetry, the shortest passages which could be 
made consistent with completeness of thought and beauty 
of expression. Setting down nothing as it was not written, 
we have yet eliminated all that seemed to be in any way 
extraneous to our chosen themes. We have sought to skim 
off what from our viewpoint was the cream of each quota- 
tion selected for inclusion, and thus fill our book with the 
richest possible material. We realize that to many persons 
this method of excision will seem inexcusable. To such we 
simply reply that it is our method; and ask that it be ac- 
cepted as a chosen condition of our task, and judged from 
the standpoint of the skill and taste displayed in its ac- 
complishment. 

Ill 

The preparation of an anthology, as we have seen, in- 
volves not only the selection, but also the arrangement of 
material. We doubt if anybody, who has not actually 
undertaken the work, can realize what it means to arrange 
material with which one has grown inordinately familiar 
through the task of selection. When perfectly done, as in 
Palgrave's Golden Treasury, arrangement becomes as in- 
visible a thing as the air. When imperfectly done, it seems 



PREFACE xiii 

to be a condition of the inevitable limitation of the task 
attempted. In both cases, the difficulties involved are 
hidden from the consciousness of those who see the finished 
product and not the structural process. 

Chronology is of course the obvious, and the most com- 
mon, method of arranging such material as my collaborator 
and I have gathered. This method, however, we abandoned 
altogether in Part I of this Anthology; and utilized only in 
rough outline form in Part II. Our desire throughout was 
to have the matter of arrangement determined not so much 
by dates, or even by subjects, as by feeling. Dates, of 
course, have played their role, as in Part II; subjects have 
worked their influence, as in Part I. But we shall be dis- 
appointed if some few readers, sensitive to the emotions 
which we have felt and tried to convey in the making of 
this book, do not catch some view at least of what has con- 
trolled us in this matter of arrangement. I know of no 
more definite way of expressing it, than to refer to what 
the musician calls " the melodic line " in the orchestral 
score of a symphony or opera. No matter how numerous 
the themes or how complicated their development, there 
runs unbroken through every great musical composition, 
like a trail through a forest, "the melodic line." This is 
the song which the musician is singing, adorned with a 
wilderness of notes and chords, now major, now minor, 
now rising to clear sonorous heights, now submerged in 
stormy sound, but always pursuing its course, and always 
clearly felt by the heart that understands. Through this 
book we have tried, as best we could, to create a " melodic 
line." We fear that it is broken at times by the fact that 
we were engaged not in singing our own song but in blend- 
ing the songs that have been sung by others. But when 
broken, it is quickly recovered, and never at any time, we 
believe, wholly lost. It is this, at any rate, which has been 



xiv PREFACE 

the motif of our arrangement; and by this, it must be 
judged. 

IV 

In closing, I must bear testimony to the inspiration in- 
volved in the preparation of this book. If our readers de- 
rive a fraction of the comfort and strength from reading it, 
which we have derived from compiling it, the Anthology 
will be indeed as a volume of holy scripture. 

Valiant is the heart of man. Set in a world whose 
bounds he cannot trace — armed with puny hands and 
brain, to do battle against the gigantic forces of sky and 
sea and earth — beset behind and before by the twin mys- 
teries of birth and death — knowing only the unknowable, 
searching only the unsearchable, living only to die — man 
has stood erect as one lifted by God's hand, and has moved 
ever onward, through centuries of unspeakable pain, fear 
and frustration, with unconquerable courage and unquench- 
able faith. It is impossible to read however imperfect a 
record of man's thoughts on death and after, as written 
from earliest to latest times, without confessing that there is 
indeed an undying fire of the divine within us, and bowing 
in adoration before it. Especially is this true of the testi- 
mony which has been coming to us from brave young 
hearts, in the filth of the trenches, in the icy wastes of the 
sea, even in the vast spaces of the air, during these years 
of the world's blackest tragedy and most awful agony. 
This Anthology is throughout profoundly eloquent of 
spiritual faith, but nowhere more so than in those poems 
at the opening and the close, telling of death met bravely 
and immortality anticipated surely, which have been written 
by the youthful soldiers of the Great War. Something 
there is within man or above him, that makes him greater 
than himself, stronger than the universe, mightier than the 
mysteries which always challenge, and sometimes beat him 



PREFACE XV 

downward, to despair. Man, in his fronting of death and 
his dream of immortality, is all that we need, after all, to 
teach us of God. The soul is its own best testimony to the 
everlasting reality of religion. 



Acknowledgments are due in this place, first of all, to 
my collaborator and dear friend, Mrs. Lillian Browne-Olf. 
Without her untiring labour, this book could never have been 
prepared; to her fine literary taste is due much of such 
merit as it may possess. The volume is hers quite as much 
as mine. We offer it together as our common handiwork. 

I would also give sincere thanks to my secretaries. Miss 
Mary C. Baker and Miss Mary Andrews, for their indis- 
pensable assistance and interest. I am grateful also to our 
publishers for their patience while the work was proceed- 
ing, and their appreciation when it was done. 

Acknowledgments and thanks to publishers and authors, 
who have generously permitted the use of copyrighted ma- 
terial, are set down in the Appendix. 

July 1,1919. J.H. H. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Dedication v 

Preface vii 

Part I — Heroic Death 1 

Part II — Immortal Life 97 

Appendix 281 

Sources 281 

Acknowledgments , . 292 

Index 297 



PART I 
HEROIC DEATH 



Man with his burning soul 
Has but an hour of breath 
To build a ship of truth 
In which his soul may sail — 
Sail on the sea of death. 
For death takes toll 
Of beauty, courage, youth. 
Of all but truth . . . 

John Masefield 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



HEROIC DEATH 



Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he 
That every man in arms should wish to be? 
It is the generous Spirit who, when brought 
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought 
Upon the plan that pleased his boyish thought: 
Whose high endeavours are an inward light 
That makes the path before him always bright: . . 
Who, doomed to go in company with Pain, 
And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train! 
Turns his necessity to glorious gain; 
In face of these doth exercise a power 
Which is our human nature's highest dower; 
Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves 
Of their bad influence, and their good receives: 
. . . Who, if he be called upon to face 
Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined 
Great issues, good or bad for human kind. 
Is happy as a Lover; and attired 
With sudden brightness, like a Man inspired; 
And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law 
In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw; 
Or if an unexpected call succeed. 
Come when it will, is equal to the need: . . . 
Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth 
For ever, and to noble deeds give birth, 
3 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Or he must fall, to sleep without his fame, 
And leave a dead unprofitable name — 
Finds comfort in himself and in his cause; 
And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws 
His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause: 
This is the happy Warrior; this is He 
That every Man in arms should wish to be. 

William Wordsworth 



With what kinds of death does the brave man have to 
do? Is it with the most honourable? But those that occur 
in war are of this kind, for in war the danger is the great- 
est and most honourable. The public honours that are 
awarded in states and by monarchs attest this. Properly, 
then, he who in the case of an honourable death, and under 
circumstances close at hand which cause death, is fearless, 
may be called courageous; and the dangers of war are, 
more than any others, of this description. 

Aristotle 



They truly live who yield their lives fighting against 
the foe in the fierce battle amid the flash of swords and 
the whirling of the spear . . . 

South Indian Tamil Book of Poems 



Not dead but living ye are to account all those who are 
slain in the way of God. 

Mohammed 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



. . . And Hector's woe, 
What is it? He is gone, and all men know 
His glory, and how true a heart he bore. . . . 

Would ye he wise, ye cities, fly from war! 
Yet if war come, there is a crown in death 
For him that striveth well and perisheth 
Unstained: to die in evil were the stain! 
Therefore, mother, pity not thy slain. 

Euripides 
6 

Eteocles, his country's friend, shall find 
Due burial in its friendly bosom. . . . 
[He] died the champion of his country's cause. 
As generous youths should die . . . 

Aeschylus 
7 

Of those who at Thermopylae were slain, 

Glorious the doom, and beautiful the lot; 
Their tomb an altar: men from tears refrain 

To honour them, and praise, but mourn them not. 
Such sepulchre, nor drear decay 

Nor all-destroying time shall waste; this right have they. 
Within their grave the home-bred glory 

Of Greece was laid; this witness gives 
Leonidas the Spartan, in whose story 

A wreath of famous virtue ever lives. 

— Simonides of Ceos 
8 

Count Roland in pain and woe and great weakness blew 
his horn. The bright blood was running from his mouth, 



6 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

and the temples of his brain were broken. . . . And [he] 
said, " Here we shall receive martyrdom, and now I know 
well that we have but a moment to live. But may all be 
thieves who do not sell themselves dearly first. Strike, 
knights, with your bright swords; so change your deaths 
and lives that sweet France be not shamed by us. . . ." 

The Song of Roland 



... I have thus spoken concerning the city ... to es- 
tablish on a firm foundation the eulogy of those of whom I 
will now speak — the greater part of their praises being 
hereby delivered. . . . There was none of these who, prefer- 
ring the further enjoyment of his wealth, was thereby grown 
cowardly. . . . They fled from shame, but with their bodies 
they stood out the battle; and so, in a moment big with 
fate it was from their glory, rather than from their fear 
that they passed away .... Such were these men, worthy of 
their country: and for you that remain, you may pray for 
a safer fortune; but you ought to be no less venturously 
minded against the foe: not weighing the profit . . . but 
contemplating the power of Athens, in her constant activity, 
and thereby becoming enamoured of her. And when she 
shall appear great to you, consider then that her glories 
were purchased by valiant men, and by men that learned 
their duty ... by such men as, though they failed in their 
attempt, yet would not be wanting to the city with their 
virtue, but made unto it a most honourable contribution. 
And having each one given his body to the commonwealth, 
they receive instead thereof a most remarkable sepulchre, 
not that wherein they are buried so much as that other 
wherein their glory is laid up, on all occasions both of word 
and deed, to be remembered evermore; . . . and their vir- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 7 

tues shall be testified not only by the inscription in stone 
at home, but in all lands wheresoever in the unwritten 
record of the mind, which far beyond any monument will 
remain with all men everlastingly. 

Thucydides {Speech of Pericles) 

10 

Brave hearts! to Britain's pride 

Once so faithful and so true, 

On the deck of fame that died; — 

With the gallant good Riou; 

Soft sigh the winds of Heaven o'er their grave! 

While the billow mournful rolls 

And the mermaid's song condoles, 

Singing glory to the souls 

Of the brave. 

Thomas Campbell 

11 

How sleep the brave who sink to rest, 
By all their country's wishes blest! 
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, 
Returns to deck their hallow'd mould, 
She there shall dress a sweeter sod 
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod. 

By fairy hands their knell is rung, 
By forms unseen their dirge is sung; 
There Honour comes, a pilgrim gray, 
To bless the turf that wraps their clay, 
And Freedom shall awhile repair 
To dwell, a weeping hermit, there! 

William Collins 



8 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

12 

. . . Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than mine: 
Yet one I would select from that proud throng, 
Partly because they blend me with his line, 
And partly that I did his sire some wrong, 
And partly that bright names will hallow song; 
And his was of the bravest, and when showered 
The death-bolts deadliest the thinn'd files along. 
Even where the thickest of war's tempest lower'd. 
They reach'd no nobler breast than thine, young gallant 
Howard. . . . 

Lord Byron 
13 

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon: 

A mile or so away 
On a little mound. Napoleon 

Stood on our storming-day; 
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 

Legs wide, arms locked behind. 
As if to balance the prone brow 

Oppressive with its mind. 

Just as perhaps he mused " My plans 

That soar, to earth may fall. 
Let once my army-leader Lannes 

Waver at yonder wall " — 
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 

A rider, bound on boimd 
Full-galloping; nor bridle drew 

Until he reached the mound. 

Then off there flung in smiling joy, 
And held himself erect 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

By just his horse's mane, a boy: 

You hardly could suspect — 
(So tight he kept his lips compressed, 

Scarce any blood came through) 
You looked twice ere you saw his breast 

Was all but shot in two. 

" Well," cried he, " Emperor, by God's grace 

We've got you Ratisbon! 
The Marshal's in the market-place, 

And you'll be there anon 
To see your flag-bird flap his vans 

Where I, to heart's desire. 
Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed; his plans 

Soared up again like fire. 

The chief's eye flashed; but presently 

Softened itself, as sheathes 
A film the mother-eagle's eye 

When her bruised eaglet breathes; 
" You're wounded ! " " Nay," the soldier's pride 

Touched to the quick, he said: 
" I'm killed. Sire ! " And his chief beside, 

Smiling, the boy fell dead. 

Robert Browning 

14 

Crouched in the sea fog on the moaning sand 
All night he lay, speaking some simple word 
From hour to hour to the slow minds that heard, 
Holding each poor life gently in his hand 
And breathing on the base rejected clay 
Till each dark face shone mystical and grand 



10 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Against the breaking day; 
And lo, the shard the potter cast away 
Was grown a fiery chalice crystal-fine 
Fulfilled of the divine 

Great wine of battle wrath by God's ring-finger stirred. 
Then upward, where the shadowy bastion loomed 
Huge on the mountain in the wet sea light, 
Whence now, and now, infernal flowerage bloomed, 
Bloomed, burst, and scattered down its deadly seed — 
They swept, and died like freemen on the height, 
Like freemen, and like men of noble breed; 
And when the battle fell away at night 
By hasty and contemptuous hands were thrust 
Obscurely in a common grave with him 
The fair-haired keeper of their love and trust. 
Now limb doth mingle with dissolved limb 
In nature's busy old democracy 
To flush the mountain laurel when she blows 
Sweet by the southern sea, 

And heart with crumbled heart climbs in the rose. . . . 

William Vaughan Moody 

15 

. . . Brave, good and true, 

I see him stand before me now. 

And read again on that young brow, 

Where every hope was new, 
How sweet were life! Yet, by the mouth firm-set, 
And look made up for Duty's utmost debt, 

I could divine he knew, 
That death within the sulphurous hostile lines, 
In the mere wreck of nobly pitched designs, 

Plucks heart's-ease, and not rue. . . . 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 11 

Right in the van, 
On the red rampart's slippery swell. 
With heart that beat a charge, he fell 

Forward, as fits a man; 
But the high soul burns on to light men's feet 
Where death for noble ends makes dying sweet; 

His life her crescent span 
Orbs full with share in their undarkening days 
Who ever climbed the battailous steeps of praise 

Since valour's praise began. . . . 

James Russell Lowell 

16 

. . . Salute the sacred dead. 

Who went and who return not. — Say not so! ... 

We rather seem the dead, that stayed behind. 

Blow, trumpets, all your exultations blow! 

For never shall their aureoled presence lack . . . 

They come transfigured back. 
Secure from change in their high-hearted ways. 
Beautiful evermore, and with the rays 
Of morn on the white shields of Expectation. 

James Russell Lowell 

17 

Fall, stream, from Heaven to bless; return as well; 
So did our sons; Heaven met them as they fell. ^ 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

18 

In an age of fops and toys, 
Wanting wisdom, void of right, 

1 Inscription for a well in memory of the martyrs of the Civil War. 



12 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Who shall nerve heroic boys 

To hazard all in Freedom's fight — 

Break sharply ojBf their jolly games, 

Forsake their comrades gay 

And quit proud homes and youthful dames 

For famine, toil and fray? 

Yet on the nimble air benign 

Speed nimbler messages. 

That waft the breath of grace divine 

To hearts in sloth and ease. 

So nigh is grandeur to our dust, 

So near is God to man. 

When duty whispers low. Thou must. 

The youth replies, / can. 

O, well for the fortunate soul 

Which Music's wings infold. 

Stealing away the memory 

Of sorrows new and old! 

Yet happier he whose inward sight, 

Stayed on his subtile thought. 

Shuts his sense on toys of time, 

To vacant bosoms brought. 

But best befriended of the God 

He who, in evil times, 

Warned by an inward voice. 

Heeds not the darkness and the dread, 

Biding by his rule and choice. 

Feeling only the fiery thread 

Leading over heroic ground. 

Walled with mortal terror round. 

To the aim which him allures, 

And the sweet heaven his deed secures. 

Peril around, all else appalling, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 13 

Cannon in front and leaden rain, 
Him duty through the clarion calling 
To the van called not in vain. 

Stainless soldier on the walls, 
Knowing this — and knows no more — 
Whoever fights, whoever falls, 
Justice conquers evermore. 
Justice after as before — 
And he who battles on her side, 
God, though he were ten times slain, 
Crowns him victor glorified, 
Victor over death and pain. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

19 

young men tliat shed your blood with so generous 
a joy for the starving eartli! heroism of the world! 
What a harvest of destruction to reap under this splendid 
summer sun ! Young men of all nations, brought into con- 
flict by a common ideal, making enemies of those who 
should be brothers; all of you, marching to your death, 
are dear to me. Slavs, hastening to the aid of your race; 
Englishmen fighting for honour and right; intrepid Bel- 
gians who dared to oppose the Teutonic colossus, and 
defend against him the Thermopylae of the West; Ger- 
mans fighting to defend the philosophy and the birthplace 
of Kant against the Cossack avalanche; and you, above 
all, my young compatriots, in whom the generation of 
heroes of the Revolution lives again; you, who for years 
have confided your dreams to me, and now, on the verge 
of battle, bid me a sublime farewell. ... my friends, 
may nothing mar your joy! Whatever fate has in store. 



14 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

you have risen to the pinnacle of earthly life. . . . And 
you will be victorious. Your self-sacrifice, your courage, 
your whole-hearted faith in your sacred cause ... all this 
assures me of your victory, young armies of the Marne 
and Meuse, whose names are graven henceforth in history 
by the side of your elders of the Great Republic. Yet 
even had misfortune decreed that you should be vanquished 
... no people could have aspired to a more noble death. 
. . . Conquerors or conquered, living or dead, rejoice! 

Romain Rolland 

20 

Ship after ship, crammed with soldiers, moved slowly 
out of the harbour, in the lovely day, and felt again the 
heave of the sea. No such gathering of fine ships has 
ever been seen upon the earth, and the beauty and exalta- 
tion of the youth upon them made them like sacred things 
as they moved away. . . . These men had come from all 
parts of the British world. . . . They had said good-bye to 
home that they might offer their lives in the cause we 
stand for. In a few hours at most, as they well knew, per- 
haps a tenth of them, would have looked their last on the 
sun, and be a part of foreign earth or dumb things that the 
tides push. Many of them would have disappeared for 
ever from the knowledge of man, blotted from the book of 
life none would know how; by a fall or a chance shot in 
the darkness, in the blast of a shell, or alone, like a hurt 
beast, in some scrub or gully, far from comrades and the 
English speech and the English singing. And perhaps a 
third of them would be mangled, blinded or broken, lamed, 
made imbecile or disfigured, with the colour and the taste 
of life taken from them, so that they would never move 
with comrades nor exult in the sun. . . .But as they moved 
out, these things were but the end they asked, the reward 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 15 

they had come for, the unseen cross upon the breast. All 
that they felt was a gladness of exultation that their young 
courage was to be used. They went like Kings in a pageant 
to the imminent death. 

As they passed from moorings to the man-of-war anchor- 
age on tlieir way to the sea, their feeling that they had 
done with life and were going out to something new, welled 
up in those battalions; they cheered and cheered till the 
harbour rang with cheering. As each ship crammed with 
soldiers drew near the battleships, the men swung their 
caps and cheered again, and the sailors answered, and 
the noise of cheering swelled, and the men in the ships 
not yet moving joined in, and the men ashore, till all 
the life in the harbour was giving thanks that it could go 
to death rejoicing. All was beautiful in that gladness of 
men about to die. . . . 

They left the harbour very, very slowly; this tumult 
of cheering lasted a long time; no one who heard it will 
ever forget it, or think of it unshaken. It broke the hearts 
of all there with pity and pride; it went beyond the guard 
of the English heart. Presently all were out . . . and 
the sun went down with marvellous colour, lighting island 
after island, and the Asian peaks, and those left behind 
in Mudros trimmed their lamps knowing that they had 
been for a little brought near to the heart of things. 

John Mdsefield 

21 

Lovers of Life! Dreamers with lifted eyes! 
O Liberty, at thy command we challenge Death! 
The monuments that show our fathers' faith 
Shall be the altars of our sacrifice. 
Dauntless, we fling our lives into the van. 



16 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Laughing at Death because within Youth's breast 
Flame lambent fires of Freedom, man for man 
We yield to thee our heritage, our best. 
Life's highest product. Youth, exults in life; 
We are Olympian Gods in consciousness; 
Mortality to us is sweet; yet less 
We value Ease when Honour sounds the strife. 
Lovers of Life, we pledge thee Liberty 
And go to death, calmly, triumphantly. 

SeTgt. J, N. Streets 

22 

Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead! 
There's none of these so lonely and poor of old, 
But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold. 
These laid the world away; poured out the red 
Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be 
Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, 
That men call age; and those who would have been, 
Their sons, they gave their immortality. 

Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth, 
Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain. 
Honour has come back, as a king, to earth, 
And paid his subjects with a royal wage; 
And Nobleness walks in our ways again; 
And we have come into our heritage. 

Rupert Brooke 

23 

Now God be thanked Who has matched us with His hour. 
And caught our youth, and waken'd us from sleeping, 

With hand made sure, clear eye and sharpen'd power, 
To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 17 

Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary, 
Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move, 

And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary. 
And all the little emptiness of love! 

Oh! we who have known shame, we have found release there, 
Where there's no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending. 
Nought broken save this body, lost but breath; 

Nothing to shake the laughing heart's long peace there 
But only agony, and that has ending; 

And the worst friend and enemy is but Death. 

Rupert Brooke 

24 

Come now, Death, 
While I am proud. 
While joy and awe are breath 
And heart beats loud! 

While all around me stand 
Men that I love. 

The wind blares aloud, the grand 
Sun wheels above. 

Naked I stand today 
Before my doom, 
Welcome what comes my way, 
Whatever come. 

What is there more to ask 
Than that I have? — 
Companions, love, a task, 
And a deep grave! 



18 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Come then, Eternity, 

If thou my lot; 

Having been thus, I cannot be 

As if I had not. 

Naked I wait my doom! 
Earth enough shroud! 
Death, in thy narrow room 
Man may be proud! 

Robert Nichols 

25 

Use me, England, in thine hour of need, 
Let thy ruling rule me now in deed. 

Thou hast given joyous life and free, 
Life whose joy now anguisheth for thee. 

Give then, England, if my life thou need. 
Gift yet fairer, Death, thy life to feed. 

Anonymous 

26 

If I should die while I am yet in France 

Before the battle clouds have rolled away, 

Give me to feel that death will but enhance 

Life's secret vision on its passing day. 

Grant then to me new, individual power 

In reverie, whilst whimsically I trace 

Thro' eager, breathless youth, each pulsing hour, 

The light and shadow on its fading face. 

And in death's soonest minute let me seek j 

Life heightened by new splendour, poise, surprise. 

New colour flushing deep its paling cheek. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 19 

New wonder looking from its tired eyes. 
Time's brought a rare patine to old Romance — 
Death has an ancient dignity in France. 

Lieut. Carroll Carstairs 



27 

I am writing you a few lines to say that I am assigned 
with my company to two French companies to defend an 
important position (hill) against the expected German of- 
fensive. My company will be in the first position to resist 
the tremendous concentration against us, and I do not 
believe there is a chance of any of us surviving the first 
rush. I am proud to be trusted with such a post of honour 
and have the greatest confidence in my own men to do 
their duty to the end. . . . My company is expected to pro- 
tect the right flank of the position and to counterattack 
at sight of first boche. In war some units have to be sacri- 
ficed for the safety of the rest, and this post has fallen to 
us and will be executed gladly as one contribution to the 
final victory. ... I want you in case I am killed to be 
brave and remember that one could not have wished a 
better way to die than for a righteous cause and one's 
country. 

An American Officer (Anonymous) 

28 

... To go out and risk death, or meet it as we can . . . 
seems (to me) like a great final examination in college 
for a degree summa vita in mortem, and it challenges the 
best in me — spurs me on to dig down for every best re- 
serve of energy, strength, and thought. ..." Death is the 
greatest event in life," and it is seldom anything is made 



20 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

of it. What a privilege then to he able to meet it in a 
manner suitable to its greatness! Once in your life to 
have met a crisis which required the use of every last latent 
capacity! It is like being able to exercise a muscle which 
has been in a sling for a long time. So for me the exami- 
nation is comparatively easy to pass. . . . 



Briggs Adams 



29 



I have a rendezvous with Death 

At some disputed barricade, 

When Spring comes round with rustling shade 

And apple blossoms fill the air. 

I have a rendezvous with Death 

When Spring brings back blue days and fair. 

It may be he shall take my hand 

And lead me into his dark land 

And close my eyes and quench my breath; 

It may be I shall pass him still. 

I have a rendezvous with Death 

On some scarred slope of battered hill, 

When Spring comes round again this year 

And the first meadow flowers appear. 

God knows 'twere better to be deep 
Pillowed in silk and scented down, 
Where love throbs out in blissful sleep. 
Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, 
When hushed awakenings are dear. 
But I've a rendezvous with Death 
At midnight in some flaming town, 
When Spring trips north again this year, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 21 

And I to my pledged word am true, 
I shall not fail that rendezvous. 

Alan Seegar 

30 

We may not know how fared your soul before 
Occasion came to try it by this test. 
Perchance, it used on lofty wings to soar; 
Again, it may have dwelt in lowly nest. 

We do not know if bygone knightly strain 
Impelled you then, or blood of humble clod 
Defied the dread adventure to attain 
The cross of honour or the peace of God. 

We see but this, that when the moment came 
You raised on high, then drained the solemn cup — 
The grail of death; that, touched by valour's flame, 
The kindled spirit burned the body up. 

Oscar C. A, Child 

31 

I, too, have loved with you our mother Earth: 
Listen'd at pensive eve the lyric thrush 
Shake out his ecstasy to lovely birth 
Rapturously in some lone shadowy bush. 
I, too, have gazed on youth: watched in his eyes 
The lightning passion flash, the vision glow, 
Have watched him as a god ascendant rise — 
I, too, have seen the fires of Youth bum low. 
Fearless you took the shadowy way with death. 
You took the harp of life with broken strings, 



22 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Sang in your passing brave of noble things. 
That brave serenity I pray to know 
When out with Death into the night I go. 

Sergt. /. A'^. Streets 

32 

Ye who have perished ere the morning broke, 
Ye whom death conquered when the noon was clear, 
And ye who left us in the battle smoke 
Through the long twilights of the latter year, 
When home was far, and death and sorrow near. 
When hope burnt feebly in the midst of pain. 
Glory ye sought, which casteth out all fear — 
Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain. 

And ye who pass upon the sea in ships. 
Whose businesses upon great waters lie. 
Who met the death unseen with smiling lips 
And gave your lives lest other men should die, 
Lo! through the steep confusion of the sky. 
Above the surge and thunder of the main, 
A voice thrills downward like a battle-cry, 
" Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain." 

No place was ours among the rank and file 

Of war; for us no sudden trumpets pealed; 

But ours to gather and to mourn awhile 

The sad and splendid leavings of the field. 

To you — to you 'twas given to bear the shield, 

To guard and cherish it without a stain — 

And when, in God's good time, these wounds are healed 

Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 23 

Ah! valiant souls, whose marching days are o'er, 
Who went to battle like a banquet spread, 
Who having walked amid the ways of war, 
Now tread the echoing pathways of the dead. 
Others have passed where now your spirits tread. 
Who perished that the world might live again, 
To them and you alike it shall be said, 
" Take comfort, for ye have not lived in vain." 

Crommelin Brown 

33 

Sleep well, heroic souls, in silence sleep, 
Lapped in the circling arms of kingly death! 
No ill can vex your slumbers, no foul breath 
Of slander, hate, derision mar the deep 
Repose that holds you close, your Kinsmen reap 
The harvest you have sown, while each man saith 
" So would I choose, when danger threateneth, 
Let my death be as theirs," we dare not weep. 
For you have scaled the starry heights of fame. 
Nor ever shrank from peril and distress 
In fight undaunted for the Conqueror's prize; 
Therefore your death, engirt with loveliness 
Of simple service done for England's name, 
Shall shine like beacon-stars of sacrifice. 

W. L. Courtney 

34 

Tread softly here: Go reverently and slow! 

Yea, let your soul go down upon its knees, 

And with bowed head, and heart abased, strive hard 

To grasp the future gain in this sore loss! 

For not one foot of this dank sod but drank 

Its surfeit of the blood of gallant men. 



24 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Who, for their faith, their hope, — for Life and Liberty, 
Here made the sacrifice, — here gave their lives, 
And gave right willingly — for you and me. 

From this vast altar-pile the souls of men 

Sped up to God in countless multitudes; 

On this grim cratered ridge they gave their all, 

And, giving, won 

The Peace of Heaven and immortality. 

Our hearts go out to them in boundless gratitude; 

If ours — then God's; for His vast charity 

All sees, all knows, all comprehends — save bounds. 

He has repaid their sacrifice, — and we — ? 

God help us if we fail to pay our d«bt 

In fullest full and all unstintingly ! 

John Oxenham 

35 

Not where they fell, upon the awful scene 
Of carnage, and encompassed by the air 
Of hellish exhalations — nay not where 
Terrific thunders mocked a sky serene. 
Loosing swift havoc where long peace had been: 
O mourners, menaced by false-tongued despair. 
Your loved ones, nobly fall'n, remain not there 
To lie beneath a coverlet of green. 

Uplifted, they attain the hero's joy 
As pensioners of God in that Estate, 
Whose soil is freedom, and whose air delight. 
While their dear mortal ruins consecrate 
The earth itself to valour's fine employ, 
Whence love's clear morn shall follow hate's wild night. 

/. Cartwright Frith 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 25 

36 

Carnage! 

Humanity disgraced! 
Time's dearest toil eflfaced! 
Poison gases and flame 
Putting Nero to shame! 
Bayonet, bomb and shell! 
Merry reading for hell! 
The wickedness! the waste! 

Courage! 

To gain their fiery goal, 

Some crumbling, bloodsoaked knoll, 

How fearlessly they fling 

Their flesh to suffering. 

Offer their ardent breath 

To gasping shuddering death! 

miracle of soul! 

Katherine Lee Bates 

37 

In lonely watches night by night 
Great visions burst upon my sight, 
For down the watches of the sky 
The hosts of dead go marching by. 

Strange ghostly banners o'er them float, 
Strange bugles sound an awful note. 
And all their faces and their eyes 
Are lit with starlight from the skies. 

The anguish and the pain have passed 
And peace hath come to them at last, 



26 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

But in their stern looks linger still 
The iron purpose and the will. 

Dear Christ, who reign'st above the flood 
Of human tears and human blood, 
A weary road these men have trod, 
house them in the house of God! 

Frederick George Scott 

38 

Adieu ! 

What need of tears 

Or fears 

For you! 

Adieu! 

This is no common day — 

Your feet upon the way 

All Knights of old have trod, 

All Saints hacked through to God. 

Your soul shall catch 

Their glinting glory: 

While from afar I watch 

How you shall match 

Their story. 

Adieu ! 

A Soldier Son (Anonymous) 

39 

All that our wonderful dead relinquish they bequeath 
to us; and when they die for us, they leave us their lives 
not in any strained metaphorical sense, but in a very real 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 27 

and direct way. Virtue goes out of every man who falls 
while performing a deed of glory; and that virtue drops 
down upon us; and nothing of him is lost and nothing 
evaporates in the shock of the premature end. He gives us 
in one solitary and mighty stroke what he would never have 
given us in a long life of duty and love. Death does not 
injure life; it is powerless against it. Life's aggregate 
never changes. What death takes from those who fall 
enters into those who are left standing. The number of 
lamps grows less, but the flame rises higher. Death is in 
no wise the gainer so long as there are living men. The 
more it exercises its ravages, the more it increases the in- 
tensity of that which it cannot touch, the more it pursues 
its phantom victories, the better does it prove to us that man 
will end by conquering death. 

Maurice Maeterlinck 

40 

Whoever comes to see that death is the immemorial sacri- 
fice of the individual to the good of the whole, that it is 
the very foundation of all the higher life, has attained an 
understanding that will appeal not only to his reason, but 
to his emotions as well. If he is so fortunate as to go yet 
further and to comprehend in his view the majestic spec- 
tacle of the on-going of life, of which the individual is 
but a noble incident, he will have at least the comfort 
which comes from the addition of dignity to grief. 

Nathaniel Shaler 

41 

Death holds a high place in the policy and great com- 
munities of the world. ... It is the part of a valiant and 
generous mind to prefer some things before life, as things 



28 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

for which a man should not doubt nor fear to die. . . . 
True natural wisdom pursueth the learning and practice 
of dying well, as the very end of life, and indeed he has 
not spent his life ill that hath learned to die well. It is 
the chiefest thing and duty of life. The knowledge of 
dying is the knowledge of liberty, the state of true free- 
dom, the way to fear nothing, to live well, contentedly and 
peaceable. 

Sir Henry Vane 

42 

Thrice happy they who to the grave depart 
With eyes on these ends fixed; they only, there. 
Have life. . . . 

Sophocles 

43 

... It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little 
infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other. He that 
dies in an earnest pursuit, is like one that is wounded in 
hot blood; who, for the time, scarce feels the hurt; and 
therefore a mind fixed and bent upon somewhat that is 
good doth avert the dolours of death. But above all, 
believe it, the sweetest canticle is Nunc dimittis when a 
man hath obtained worthy ends and expectations. . . . 

Francis Bacon 

44 

It is a shame to crave long life. . . . What delight 

Bring days, one with another, setting us 

Forward or backward on our path to de^th? 

I would not take the fellow at a gift 

Who warms himself with unsubsUPtia^l hopes; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 29 

But bravely to live on, or bravely end, 
Is due to gentle breeding. . . . 

Sophocles 

45 

When I do count the clock that tells the time, 

And see the brave day sunk in hideous night; 

When I behold the violet past prime, 

And sable curls all silver 'd o'er with white; 

When lofty trees I see barren of leaves 

Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, 

And summer's green, all girded up in sheaves, 

Borne in the bier with white and bristly beard ; 

Then of thy beauty do I question make. 

That thou among the wastes of time must go. 

Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake 

And die as fast as they see others grow; 

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence 

Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence. 

William Shakespeare 

46 

As for me, I see no such great reason why I should either 
be proud to live, or fear to die. I have had good experi- 
ence of this world. I have known what it is to be a sub- 
ject, and I now know what it is to be a sovereign. . . , 
When I call to mind things past, behold things present, 
and look forward to things to come, I count them happiest 
that go hence soonest. Nevertheless ... I am armed with 
better courage than is common in my sex, so that what- 
soever befalls me, death shall never find me unprepared. 

Queen Elizabeth 



30 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

47 

... In my best meditations I do often defy death; I 
honour any man that contemns it, nor can highly love any 
that is afraid of it. . . . 

Sir Thomas Browne 

48 

I do not fear to die. I assure you, as in the presence 
of God, that if on this very night, suddenly, the summons 
to death were to reach me, I should bear it with calm- 
ness; I should raise my hands to heaven, and say " Blessed 
be God." 

Immanuel Kant 

49 

. . . Life is not the greatest good, since the foundation 
of all morality is that many things are to be preferred to 
life; and death is not the greatest evil, since we are men, 
so to speak, only in so far as we rise above the fear of 
death. 

M. Brunetiere 



50 



What need have I to fear — so soon to die? 
Let me work on, not watch and wait in dread: 
What will it matter, when that I am dead. 
That they bore hate or love who near me lie? 
'Tis but a lifetime, and the end is nigh 
At best or worst. Let me lift up my head 
And firmly, as with inner courage, tread 
Mine own appointed way, on mandates high. 
Pain could but bring, from all its evil store. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 31 

The close of pain: hate's venom could but kill; 
Repulse, defeat, desertion could no more. 
Let me have lived my life, not cowered until 
The unhindered and unhastened hour was here. 
So soon — what is there in the world to fear? 

Edward Rowland Sill 

51 

Fear death? — to feel the fog in my throat, 

The mist in my face, 
When the snows begin, and the blasts denote 

I am nearing the place, 
The power of the night, the press of the storm, 

The post of the foe; 
Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form. 

Yet the strong man must go: 
For the journey is done and the summit attained. 

And the barriers fall, 
Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, 

The reward of it all. 
I was ever a fighter, so — one fight more. 

The best and the last! 
I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, 

And bade me creep past. 
No ! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers 

The heroes of old. 
Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears 

Of pain, darkness, and cold. 
For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, 

The black minute's at end, 
And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, 

Shall dwindle, shall blend. 
Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, 

Then a light, then thy breast, 



32 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, 
And with God be the rest! 

Robert Browning 

52 

. . . Death is a thing to be despised! Which either 
ought altogether to be regarded with indifference, if it en- 
tirely annihilates the mind, or ought even to be desired, 
if it leads it to a place where it is destined to be immortal. 

Cicero 

53 

Cowards die many times before their deaths; 

The valiant never taste of death but once. 

Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, 

It seems to me most strange that men should fear; 

Seeing that death a necessary end 

Will come, when it will come. 

William Shakespeare 

54 

Bacon has justly noticed that while death is often re- 
garded as the supreme evil, there is no human passion that 
does not become so powerful as to lead men to despise it. 
It is not in the waning days of life, but in the full strength 
of youth, that men, through ambition or the mere love of 
excitement, fearlessly and joyously encounter the risk. 
Encountered in hot blood it is seldom feared, and innum- 
erable accounts of shipwrecks and other accidents, and 
many episodes in every war show conclusively how calmly 
honour, duty and discipline can enable men of no extraor- 
dinary characters, virtues or attainments, to meet it even 
when it comes before them suddenly, as an inevitable fact, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 33 

and without any of that excitement which might blind their 
eyes. 

r. E. H, Lecky 

55 

There is nothing that nature has made necessary which 
is more easy than death. What a shame, then, to stand in 
fear of anything so long that is over so soon! It is not 
death itself that is dreadful, but the fear of it that goes 
before. 

Why was such a one taken away in the prime of his 
years? Life is to be measured by action, not by time. 
A man may die old at thirty, and young at fourscore. 
Nay, the one lives after death, and the other perished be- 
fore he died. The fear of death is a continual slavery, as 
the contempt of it is certain liberty. 

Seneca 

56 

[The wise man] will live without either pursuing or 
flying from death, but whether for a longer or a shorter 
time he shall have the soul enclosed in the body, he cares 
not at all; for even if he must depart immediately, he 
will go as readily as if he were going to do anything else 
which can be done with decency and order. . . . [For] 
what means all this? Thou hast embarked, thou hast made 
the voyage, thou art come to shore; get out! 

Marcus Aurelius 

57 

... A freeman thinks of nothing less than of death. 
His wisdom is a meditation not of death, but of life. . . . 

Spinoza 



34 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

58 

. . . Suppose then that [you] may lose [your] life 
in this way. You will die a good man, doing a noble act. 
For since we must certainly die, of necessity a man must 
be found doing something, either following the employ- 
ment of a husbandman, or digging, or trading, or serv- 
ing in a consulship. . . . What then do you wish to be 
doing when you are found by death? I for my part would 
wish to be found doing something which belongs to a man, 
beneficent, suitable to the general interest, noble. . . . 

Epictetus 

59 

As the production of the metal proveth the work of 
the alchemist, so is death the test of our lives, the assay 
which sheweth the standard of all our actions. 

He hath not spent his life ill, who knoweth to die well; 
neither can he have lost all his time, who employeth the 
last portion of it to his honour. 

Avoid not death, for it is a weakness; fear it not, for 
thou understandeth not what it is; all that thou certainly 
knowest is, that it putteth an end to thy sorrows. 

Think not the longest life the happiest; that which is 
best employed, doth man the most honour. . . . 

Indian Manuscript 



60 

Old age will give the coward no peace, though spears 
may spare him. 

His destiny let no man know beforehand; his mind will 
be freest from care. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 35 

Cattle die, kindred die, we ourselves also die; but the fair 
fame never dies of him who has earned it. 

Saemund 

61 

Think not that I fear the world, or my departure from 
it. Death being a fact, I have no fear of it. That which 
I alone fear is not having lived well enough. What does 
it matter whether we live in the world a hundred years 
or but one day? Let us take care that the bowl of our 
form hold the heart's good wine, before we become clay 
again for the potter to mould into other shapes. 

Kheyam 

62 

If life be a pleasure, yet since death also is sent by the 
hand of the same Master, neither should that displease us. 

Michael Angela 

63 

Death is certain to all things which are subject to birth. 
Wherefore it does not behove thee to grieve about that 
which is inevitable. Stand firm in the path of truth. . . . 
Perform thy duty. Be free from care and trouble, and 
turn thy mind to things which are spiritual. 

Bhagavadgita 

64 

If thou hast a good conscience, thou wilt not greatly fear 
death. 

Labour so to live, that at the hour of death thou mayest ^ 
rather rejoice than fear. 

Thomas a Kempis 



36 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

65 

I know no privilege so great as that of dying; but it is 
a privilege to those in whom evil is more and more sub- 
dued, and who go more and more beyond themselves. 

William Ellery Channing 

66 

Give me a soul which can grim death defy, 
And count it Nature's privilege to die. 

Juvenal 

67 

Youth whose hope is high, 
Who dost to Truth aspire. 
Whether thou live or die, 
look not back nor tire. 

Thou that art bold to fly 
Through tempest, flood and fire, 
Nor dost not shrink to try 
Thy heart in torments dire: 

If thou canst Death defy. 
If thy Faith is entire, 
Press onward, for thine eye 
Shall see thy heart's desire. 

Beauty and love are nigh. 
And with their deathless quire 
Soon shall thine eager cry 
Be numbered and expire. 

Robert Bridges 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 37 

68 

... It is better to lose health like a spendthrift than 
to waste it like a miser. It is better to live and be done 
with it than to die daily in the sick-room. By all means 
begin your folio; ... a spirit goes out of a man who 
means execution, which outlives the most untimely ending. 
. . . All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, 
have done good work, although they may die before they 
have the time to sign it. Every heart that has beat strong 
and cheerfully has left a hopeful impulse behind it in the 
world, and bettered the tradition of mankind. And even 
if death catch people, like an open pitfall, and in mid- 
career, laying out vast projects, and planning monstrous 
foundations, flushed with hope ... is there not something 
brave and spirited in such a termination? and does not 
life go down with a better grace, foaming in full body 
over a precipice, than miserably straggling to an end in 
sandy deltas? When the Greeks made their fine saying 
that those whom the gods love die young, I cannot help 
believing they had this sort of death also in their eye. 
For surely, at whatever age it overtake the man, this is 
to die young. Death has not been suffered to take so 
much as an illusion from his heart. In the hot-fit of life, 
a-tip-toe on the highest point of being, he passes at a 
bound on to the other side. The noise of the mallet and 
-chisel is scarcely quenched, the trumpets are hardly done 
blowing, when, trailing with him clouds of glory, this 
happy-starred, full-blooded spirit shoots into the spiritual 
land. 

Robert Louis Stevenson 



38 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

69 

. . . The flesh is a cloud upon genius. Death, that im- 
mense light, comes and penetrates the man with its aurora. 
No more flesh, no more matter, no more shadow. The 
unknown which was within him manifests itself and beams 
forth. In order that a mind may give all its light, death 
is required. 

. . . The grave is a crucible. The earth thrown on a 
man cleanses his name, and allows it not to pass forth 
till purified. . . . 

Victor Hugo 

70 

If I must die 
I will encounter darkness as a bride 
And hug it in my arms. 

William Shakespeare 

71 

Fear death! It is the most beautiful adventure in life. 

Charles Frohman 

72 

If in the noon they doubted, in the night 

They never swerved. Death has no power to appal. 
There was one Way, one Truth, one Life, one Light, 

One Love that shone triumphant over all. 

If in the noon they doubted, at the last 

There was no way to part, no way but One 
That rolled the waves of Nature back and cast 

In ancient days a shadow across the sun. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 39 

If in the noon they doubted, their last breath 

Saluted once again the eternal goal, 
Chanted a love-song in the face of Death 

And sent the veil of darkness from the soul. 

If in the noon they doubted, in the night 

They waved the shadowy world of strife aside, 

Flooded high heaven with an immortal light, 
And taught the deep how the Creator died. 

Alfred Noyes 

73 

Southward with fleet of ice 

Sailed the corsair Death; 
Wild and fast blew the blast, 

And the east wind was his breath. ... 

Eastward from Campobello 

Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed; 
Three days or more seaward he bore, 

Then, alas! the land-wind failed. 

Alas! the land-wind failed. 

And ice-cold grew the night; 
And nevermore, on sea or shore. 

Should Sir Humphrey see the light. 

He sat upon the deck, 

The Book was in his hand; 
"Do not fear! Heaven is as near," 

He said, " by water as by land." 

In the first watch of the night, 
Without a signal's sound. 



40 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Out of the sea, mysteriously, 

The fleet of Death rose all around. , • • 

Southward forever southward. 

They drift through dark and day; 

And like a dream, in the Gulf -Stream 
Sinking, vanish all away. 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

74 

Not here! the white North has thy bones; and thou, 

Heroic sailor-soul. 
Art passing on thine happier voyage now 

Toward no earthly pole. 

Alfred Tennyson 

75 

Friday, March 16. . . . Tragedy all along the line. At 
lunch the day before yesterday, poor Titus Oates said he 
couldn't go on; he proposed we should leave him in his 
sleeping bag. That we could not do, and induced him to 
come on, on the afternoon march. In spite of its awful 
nature for him, he struggled on and we made a few miles. 
At night he was worse and we knew the end had come. 

Should this be found I want these facts recorded. Oates's 
last thoughts were of his Mother, but immediately before 
he took pride in thinking that his regiment would be pleased 
with the bold way in which he met his death. We can 
testify to his bravery. He has borne intense suffering for 
weeks without complaint, and to the very last was able and 
willing to discuss outside subjects. He did not — would 
not — give up hope to the very end. He was a brave soul. 
This was the end. He slept through the night before last, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 41 

hoping not to wake; but he woke in the morning — yester- 
day. It was blowing a blizzard. He said, " I am just going 
outside and may be some time." He went out into the 
blizzard and we have not seen him since. . . . We knew that 
poor Gates was walking to his death, but though we tried to 
dissuade him, we knew it was the act of a brave man and 
an English gentleman. 

Capt, Robert F. Scott 

76 

... As near to the site of the death as we could judge, 
we built (a) cairn to his memory, and placed thereon a 
small cross and the following record, " Hereabouts died 
a very gallant gentleman. Captain L. E. G. Gates, of the 
Inniskilling Dragoons. In March, 1912, returning from 
the Pole, he walked willingly to his death in a blizzard, 
to try and save his comrades, beset by hardships. This 
note is left by the relief Expedition of 1912." 

E, L, Atkinson 

77 

. . . Gur wreck is certainly due to this sudden advent 
of severe weather, which does not seem to have any satis- 
factory cause. I do not think human beings ever came 
through such a month as we have come through. . . . For 
four days we have been unable to leave the tent — the 
gale is howling about us. We are weak, writing is diffi- 
cult, but for my own part I do not regret this journey, 
which has shown that Englishmen can endure hardships, 
help one another, and meet death with as great a fortitude 
as ever in the past. We took risks, we knew we took them; 
things have come out against us, and therefore we have 
no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of Provideince, 



42 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

determined still to do our best to the last. But if we 
have been willing to give our lives to this enterprise, 
which is for the honour of our country, I appeal to our 
countrymen to see that those who depend on us are prop- 
erly cared for. 

Had we lived I should have had a tale to tell of the 
hardihood, endurance, and courage of my companions 
which would have stirred the heart of every Englishman. 
These rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the 
tale. ... 

Capt. Robert F. Scott 

78 

He [the elder Pliny] ordered the galleys put out to 
sea, and went himself on board with an intention of as- 
sisting not only Rectina, but the several other towns which 
lay thickly strewn along that beautiful coast. Hastening 
then to the place whence others fled with the utmost ter- 
ror, he steered his course direct to the point of danger, 
and with as much calmness and presence of mind as to 
be able to make and dictate his observations upon the mo- 
tion and all the phenomena of that dreadful scene. He 
was so close to the mountain that the cinders which grew 
thicker and hotter the nearer he approached, fell into 
the ship, together with pumice-stones and black pieces 
of burning rocks; they were in danger too not only of 
being aground by the sudden retreat of the sea, but also 
from the vast fragments which rolled down from the 
mountain and obstructed all the shore. Here he stopped 
to consider whether he should go back again — " For- 
tune," he said to the pilot, " favors the brave: steer to 
where Pomponianus is " . . . 

... It [the wind] was favourable to carrying my uncle 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 43 

to Pomponianus whom he found in the greatest consterna- 
tion: he embraced him tenderly, encouraging and urging 
him to keep up his spirit; and the more effectually to 
soothe his fears by seeming unconcerned himself, ordered 
a bath to be got ready, and then after having bathed sat 
down to supper with great cheerfulness, or at least (what 
is just as heroic) with every appearance of it. 

Meanwhile broad flames shone out in several places 
from Mount Vesuvius, which the darkness of the night 
contributed to render still brighter and clearer. But my 
uncle, in order to soothe the apprehensions of his friend, 
assured him it was only the burning of the villages: — 
after this he retired to rest, and it is most certain he was 
so little disquieted as to fall into a sound sleep. . . . 
The court which led to his apartment being now almost 
filled with stones and ashes, if he had continued there any 
time longer it would have been impossible for him to 
make his way out, so he was awoke and got up, and went to 
Pomponianus and the rest of the company. . . . They 
consulted together whether it was most prudent to trust 
to the houses . , . which now rocked from side to side with 
frequent and violent concussions, as though shaken from 
their very foundations ... or fly to the open fields, where 
the calcined stones and cinders . . . fell in large showers 
and threatened destruction. In this choice of dangers they 
resolved for the fields, a resolution, which while the rest 
of the company were hurried into it by their fears, my 
uncle embraced with cool and deliberate consideration. . . . 

They thought proper to go further down upon the shore 
to see if they might safely put out to sea, but found the 
waves still running extremely high and boisterous. There 
my uncle laying himself down upon a sail-cloth, called 
twice for some cold water, which he drank, when imme- 
diately the flames, preceded by a strong whiff of sulphur, 



44 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

dispersed the party and obliged him to rise. He raised 
himself with the assistance of two of his servants, and 
instantly fell down dead, suffocated, as I conjecture, by 
some gross and noxious vapour. 

As soon as it was light again, which was not till the 
third day after this melancholy accident, his body was 
found entire and without any marks of violence upon it, 
in the dress in which he fell and looking more like a man 
asleep than dead. . . . Farewell. 

Pliny the Younger 

79 

Our city was in danger of being effaced; and no man 
among the rich, or eminent, or illustrious, dared to ap- 
pear in public, but all fled, and hurried out of the way. 
But they who feared God, the men who passed their lives 
in monasteries, hastened down with much boldness, and 
set all free from this terror . . . they cast themselves 
willingly into the midst of the fire and rescued all ; and as 
for death, which seems universal and awful, they awaited 
it with the utmost readiness and ran to meet it with more 
pleasure than others do toward principalities and honours. 

St. John Chrysostom 

80 

. . . Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail. 
Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt. 
Dispraise, or blame, nothing but well and fair. 
And what may quiet in a death so noble. . . . 

John Milton 

81 

. . . Death is not, then, an object of dread. . . . How 
many have consecrated their life by the renown of their 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 45 

death alone, how many have been ashamed to live, and 
have found death a gain! We have read how often by 
the death of one, great nations have been delivered. . . . 
By the death of martyrs religion has been defended, faith 
increased, the Church strengthened; the dead have con- 
quered, the persecutors have been overcome. . . . The death 
itself of the martyrs is the prize of their life. 

Saint Ambrose 

82 

... I see a beautiful city and a brilliant people rising 
out of this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, 
in their triumphs and defeats, through long, long years 
to come, I see the evil of this time, and of the previous 
time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making 
expiation for itself and wearing out. 

I see the lives for which I lay down my life, peaceful, 
useful, prosperous and happy, in that England which I 
shall see no more. ... 

It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever 
done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have 
ever known. 

Charles Dickens 

83 

Lavinia — . . . Do not think that it is easy for us to die. 
Our faith makes life far stronger and more wonder- 
ful in us than when we walked in darkness and had 
nothing to live for. Death is harder for us than for 
you: the martyr's agony is as bitter as his triumph is 
glorious. 

The Captain — A martyr, Lavinia, is a fool. Your death 
will prove nothing. . . , 



46 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Lavinia — Then why kill me? 

The Captain — I mean that truth, if there be any truth, 
needs no martyrs. 

Lavinia — No; but my faith, like your sword, needs test- 
ing. Can you test your sword except by staking your 
life on it? 

G. Bernard Shaw 

84 

Creep into thy narrow bed, 
Creep, and let no more be said! 
Vain thy onset! all stands fast. 
Thou thyself must break at last. 

Let the long contention cease! 
Geese are swans, and swans are geese. 
Let them have it how they will! 
Thou art tired; best be still. 

They out-talked thee, hiss'd thee, tore thee? 
Better men fared thus before thee; 
Fired their ringing shot and pass'd, 
Hotly charged — and sank at last. 

Charge once more, then, and be dumb! 
Let the victors, when they come. 
When the forts of folly fall. 
Find thy body by the wall! 

Matthew Arnold 



85 



Ay, tear his body limb from limb, 
Bring cord, or ax, or flame; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 47 

He only knows that not through him 
Shall England come to shame. 

Sir F, H. Doyle 

86 

Like a triumphal path he trod 
The thorns of death and shame. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley 

87 

Patriots have toiled, and in their country's cause 
Bled nobly; and their deeds, as they deserve, 
Receive proud recompense. We give in charge 
Their names to the sweet lyre. ... 
But fairer wreaths are due, though never paid, 
To those who, posted at the shrine of truth, 
Have fallen in her defence. A patriot's blood, 
Well spent in such a strife, may earn indeed, 
And for a time ensure to his loved land, 
The sweets of liberty and equal laws. 
But martyrs struggle for a brighter prize. 
And win it with more pain. Their blood is shed 
In confirmation of the noblest claim. 
Our claim to feed upon immortal truth, 
To walk with God, to be divinely free, 
To soar, and to anticipate the skies. 
Yet few remember them. ... 

William Cowper 



88 



Through the straight pass of suffering 
The martyrs ever trod. 



48 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Their feet upon temptation, 
Their faces upon God. 

A stately, shriven company; 
Convulsion playing round, 
Harmless as streaks of meteor 
Upon a planet's bound. 

Their faith the everlasting troth; 
Their expectation fair; 
The needle to the north degree 
Wades so, through polar air. 

Emily Dickinson 

89 

Triimiph may be of several kinds. 
There's triumph in the room 
When that old imperator. Death, 
By faith is overcome. . . . 

Emily Dickinson 

90 

You have gained but little, Athenians, and at how great 
a cost! . . . Could you have waited but a little while, 
the event would have come of itself. My age is not hidden; 
you see that I am far on in life and near to death. I 
am not speaking now to all, but to those of you who voted 
my death. And to them I say: You suppose, gentlemen, 
that I have lost through lack of words to convince you, 
even provided I had stooped to say and do anything to 
escape. Not so. I am cast, not through lack of words, 
but through lack of impudence and shamelessness, and 
because I would not speak what you are most pleased 
to hear, nor weep and wail, nor do and say a thousand 
other degrading things which others have taught you to 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 49 

expect. At the time it did not seem worth while to de- 
mean myself as a slave through fear; neither do I now 
repent of my manner of defence. I choose to defend my- 
self thus and die, rather than as you would have me and 
live. Neither in war nor in a lawsuit ought a man . . . 
to accept every means of avoiding death. In battle, for 
instance, a man often sees that he may save his life by 
throwing away his arms and falling in supplication be- 
fore his pursuers; and so in all times of peril there are 
ways of escape if one will submit to any baseness. Nay, 
Athenians, it is not so hard to shun death, but hard in- 
deed to shun evil, for it runs more swiftly than death. I, 
you see, an old man and slow of gait, have been overtaken 
by the slow runner; whereas my accusers, who are young 
and nimble, are caught by the swift runner, which is 
wickedness. And now I go away condemned by you to 
death, but they depart hence condemned by truth herself 
to injustice and sin. I abide by my award, and they by 
theirs. ... I at least am content. For [I am] of good 
hope toward death, being persuaded of this one thing at 
least, that no evil can befall a good man either in life or 
death, and that his affairs are all in the hands of God. 
. . . And now it is time to depart hence, I to die and you 
to live; but which of us goes to the better fate no one 
knows save only God. 

Plato (Apology of Socrates) 

91 

When he had said this, he arose and went into another 
room to bathe, and took Crito with him, bidding us remain 
where we were. And when he had bathed, and his sons 
were brought in to him, and the women of his house came, 
and he had talked with them and given his parting com- 



50 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

mands in the presence of Crito, then at last he sent away 
the women and children and came back to us. And it was 
near the setting of the sun, for he had remained a long 
while within. So he came and sat with us after the bath, 
but not much was spoken. And presently the jailer ap- 
peared and approaching him said : " I shall have no fault 
to find with you, Socrates, as with others who are provoked 
and curse me when by order of the magistrates I bid them 
drink the poison. During all this time I have found you 
the noblest and gentlest and best man of all who have ever 
come here; and I am sure you will not be angry with me 
now, but with those whom you know to be responsible. 
You imderstand why I am come; it is farewell, and try to 
bear as lightly as you may what can't be helped." With 
that the man burst into tears and turned to go out. And 
Socrates looking up at him replied, " Farewell to you, I will 
do as you bid." Then turning to us, he continued : " How 
courteous the fellow is; all the while I have been here, he 
has been coming to me and talking at times, and has shown 
himself the kindest of men; and now how generously he 
weeps for me. — But come, Crito, we must do as he orders. 
Let some one fetch the poison, if it is prepared; and if it 
is not ready, bid the man prepare it." And Crito said : " I 
think, Socrates, the sun is still upon the hilltops, and has 
not set. And I know, too, that others take the cup quite 
late after the notice is given, eating and drinking abundantly 
and even indulging their other appetites. Do not hurry, 
for there is still time." Then said Socrates : " Naturally 
those you mention, Crito, act so, for they suppose it is a 
gain to them; and it is natural that I should not act so, for 
in delaying the draught I see no other profit than the win- 
ning of my own contempt for clinging greedily to a life 
that is all but spent already. Come, I beg you, do as I 
wish." 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 51 

Thereupon Crito, hearing this, made a sign to his slave 
who stood by. And the slave went out and after a con- 
siderable time returned bringing the man who was to give 
the poison, and who now carried the cup ready in his hand. 
Socrates saw the man and said : " Very good, my friend ; 
you understand these matters; what am I to do? " "Noth- 
ing," he replied, " except drink the poison and walk about 
until your legs grow heavy; then lie down and it will work 
of itself." And so saying he handed the cup to Socrates. 
He received it quite cheerfully, never trembling or chang- 
ing color or countenance; but looking up at the man with 
that steady gaze of his, he asked, " What say you? is it per- 
mitted to make a libation to the gods from this cup? " 
" We prepare only what we think a sufficient draught, 
Socrates," he answered. " I understand, but at least we are 
permitted, nay, obliged to pray the gods to grant us a happy 
journey from this world to the other. So I pray, and so 
may it be." And with these words he raised the cup to his 
lips and drank, very calmly and cheerfully. Until then 
most of us had been able to hold back our tears pretty 
well, but when we saw him drinking and the cup now 
drained, it was too much. In spite of my efforts my own 
tears began to fall fast, so that covering up my face I gave 
myself to weeping. Even before me Crito had left the 
room, unable to restrain his tears. As for Apollodorus, 
he had never left off weeping the whole time, and now be- 
tween his sobs and lamentations he broke out into a loud 
cry that completely unnerved us. Only Socrates remained 
quiet and rebuked us, saying: "What a thing you are 
doing, my dear friends! For this reason chiefly I dismissed 
the women, dreading their disturbance; for I have heard 
that a man should die in peace and silence. I bid you be 
quiet and brave." At this we were shamed by his words 
and ceased from weeping. He meanwhile was walking 



52 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

about; and when now his legs grew heavy, he lay down on 
his back as directed. The man who had given the drink felt 
his feet and legs from time to time; and finally pressing 
his foot hard asked if he felt anything; and Socrates said 
no. After that he pressed his knees and so upward, show- 
ing us he was growing cold and rigid. And Socrates him- 
self felt them, and said he should leave us when the numb- 
ness reached his heart. He had now veiled himself in his 
mantle, but when he was beginning to grow cold about the 
groin, he drew the covering a moment from his face and 
said : " Crito, I owe a cock to Aesculapius. Do not forget 
to pay it." — and these were his last words. " It shall be 
done," answered Crito ; " but have you nothing else to 
say? " He made no reply to this question; but after "a. lit- 
tle while there was a movement, and the man uncovered 
him, and his eyes were fixed. And Crito, seeing him, 
closed his mouth and eyes. 

So passed away our friend, Escherates, who was, I 
think, of all living men I have known, the best and wisest 
and the most just. 

Plato 

92 

Howbeit many in Israel were fully resolved and con- 
firmed in themselves not to eat any unclean thing. Where- 
fore they chose rather to die that they might not be 
defiled . . ., and that they might not profane the holy cove- 
nant; so they died. 

/ Maccabees 

93 

. . . Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called 
Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples. Sit ye here, while 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 53 

I go and pray yonder. And he took with him Peter and 
the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and 
very heavy. 

Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceedingly sorrow- 
ful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me. 
And he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and 
prayed, saying, my Father, if it be possible, let this cup 
pass from me: nevertlieless, not as I will, but as thou wilt. 

And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them 
asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could you not watch 
with me one hour? Watch and pray, that ye enter not into 
temptation : the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. 

He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, 
my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, 
except I drink it, thy will be done. 

And he came and found them asleep again: for their 
eyes were heavy. And he left them and went away again, 
and prayed the third time, saying the same words. Then 
cometh he to his disciples, and saith unto them; Sleep on 
now, and take your rest: behold, the hour is at hand, and 
the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 
Rise, let us be going: behold, he is at hand that doth be- 
tray me. 

And while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, 
came, and with him a great multitude with swords and 
staves, from the chief priests and elders of the people. 
Now he that betrayed him gave them a sign, saying, Whom- 
soever I shall kiss, that same is he: hold him fast. And 
forthwith he came to Jesus, and said, Hail, master; and 
kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, Friend, wherefore 
art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, 
and took him. 

And, behold, one of them which were with Jesus stretched 
out his hand and drew his sword, and struck a servant of 



54 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

the high priest's, and smote off his ear. Then said Jesus 
unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all 
they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. . . . 
And Jesus said to the multitudes. Are ye come out as against 
a thief with swords and staves for to take me? I sat daily 
with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on 
me. . . . 

Then all the disciples forsook him and fled. 

And they that had laid hold on Jesus led him away to 
Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and elders were 
assembled. . . . And they all sought witness against Jesus, 
to put him to death; but found none: yea, though many 
false witnesses came, yet found they none. At the last 
came two false witnesses, and said, This fellow said, I am 
able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three 
days. And the high priest arose, and said unto him, An- 
swerest thou nothing? What is it which these witness 
against thee? But Jesus held his peace. 

And the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure 
thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be 
the Christ, the Son of God. Jesus saith unto him. Thou 
hast said: nevertheless I say unto you. Hereafter shall ye 
see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and 
coming in the clouds of heaven. 

Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying. He hath 
spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? 
. . . What think ye? They answered and said. He is guilty 
of death. Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him; 
and others smote him with the palms of their hands, saying, 
Prophesy unto us, thou Christ, who is he that smote 
thee? . . . 

When the morning was come, all the chief priests and 
elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 55 

to death: and when they had bound him, they led him 
away, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. . . . 

And Pilate, when he had called together the chief 
priests and the rulers and the people, said unto them. Ye 
have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the 
people: and behold, I have examined him, . . . have found 
no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye 
accuse him: ... I will therefore chastise him, and release 
him. . . . 

And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this 
man, and release unto us Barabbas. ... 

Pilate, therefore, willing to release Jesus, spoke again 
unto them. But they cried, saying. Crucify him, crucify 
him. And he said unto them the third time. Why, what 
evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in 
him: I will therefore chastise him, and let him go. And 
they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might 
be crucified. 

And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. 
And Pilate . . . when he had scourged Jesus, delivered him 
to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took 
Jesus into the common hall, and gathered unto him the 
whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him, and put on 
him a scarlet robe. And when they had platted a crown 
of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right 
hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked 
him, saying. Hail, King of the Jews. And they spit upon 
him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. And 
after they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, 
and put his own raiment on him, and led him away to 
crucify him. . . . And there followed him a great company 
of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented 
him. . . . 



56 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

And when they were come to the place which is called 
Calvary, there they crucified him. . . . Then said Jesus, 
Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. 

And they parted his raiment, and cast lots. And the 
people stood beholding. And the rulers also with them 
derided him, saying. He saved others; himself he cannot 
save. And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, 
and offering him vinegar, and saying. If thou be the king 
of the Jews, save thyself. And a superscription also was 
written over him. . . . This is the King of the Jews. . . . 

And it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness 
over all the earth. . . . And Jesus cried with a loud voice. 
Father, into thy hands I conunend my spirit; and having 
said this, he gave up the ghost. . . . 

The Gospels 

94 

When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, 
and they gnashed on him (Stephen) with their teeth. 

But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stead- 
fastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus 
standing on the right hand of God, and said. Behold, I 
see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on 
the right hand of God. 

Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their 
ears, and ran upon him with one accord, and cast him out of 
the city . . . and stoned him. And they stoned Stephen, 
calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my 
spirit. 

And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice. Lord, 
lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said 
this, he fell asleep. 

The Acts of the Apostles 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 57 

95 

The martyrs shrank from suffering like other men, but 
such natural shrinking was incommensurable with apos- 
tasy. No intensity of torture had any means of affecting 
what was a mental conviction; and the sovereign Thought 
in which they had lived was their adequate support and 
consolation in their death. To them the prospect of wounds 
and loss of limbs was not more terrible than it is to the 
combatant of this world. They faced the implements of 
torture as the soldier takes his post before the enemy's 
battery. They cheered and ran forward to meet his at- 
tack, and as it were dared him, if he would, to destroy 
the numbers who were ready to close up the foremost rank, 
as their comrades who had filled it fell. And when Rome 
at last found she had to deal with a host of Scaevolas, then 
the proudest of earthly sovereignties, arrayed in the com- 
pleteness of her material resources, humbled herself be- 
fore a power which was founded on a mere sense of the 
unseen. ... 

At that time Polycarp, the familiar friend of St. John 
and a contemporary of Ignatius, suffered in his extreme old 
age. When, before his sentence, the Proconsul bade him 
" swear by the fortunes of Caesar, and have done with 
Christ," his answer betrayed that intimate devotion to the 
self-same Idea, which had been the inward life of Ig- 
natius. " Eighty and six years," he answered, "have I 
been His servant, and He has never wronged me, but ever 
has preserved me; and how can I blaspheme my King and 
my Saviour? " When they would have fastened him to 
the stake, he said: "Let alone; He who gives me to 
bear the fire, will give me also to stand firm upon the 
pyre without your nails." 

John Henry Newman 



58 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

96 

When blessed Vincent was put to the torture, with eager 
countenance, and strengthened by the presence of God, 
he cried: This it is which I have always desired, and 
for which in all my prayers I have made request. 

Church Service 

97 

. . . The trial being ended, Jerome received the same 
sentence as had been passed on Huss, . . . but, being a 
layman, had not to undergo the ceremony of degradation. 

. . . They delayed the execution for two days, in hopes 
that he would recant; during which time the Cardinal of 
Florence used his utmost endeavours to bring him over, but 
all proved ineffectual: Jerome was resolved to seal his 
doctrine with his blood. 

On his way to the place of execution he sang several 
hymns; and on arriving at the spot where Huss had suf- 
fered, kneeled down and prayed fervently. He embraced 
the stake with great cheerfulness; and when the execu- 
tioner went behind him to set fire to the fagots, he said: 
" Come here and kindle it before my eyes ; for had I been 
afraid of it, I had not come here, having had so many op- 
portunities to escape." When the flames enveloped him 
he sang a hymn; and the last words he was heard to say 
were — " Hanc animam in flammis aff ero, Christe, tibi ! " 

Foxe 



98 

I have fought: that is much — victory is in the hands 
of fate. Be that it as it may with me, this at least future 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 59 

ages will not deny of me, be the victor who may — that I 
did not fear to die, yielded to none of my fellows in 
constancy, and preferred a spirited death to a cowardly 
life. . . . 

Greater perhaps is your fear in pronouncing my sen- 
tence than mine in hearing it. 

They are fools who dread the menace of death, for this 
your body is constantly passing away and being renewed. 

The wise man fears not death; yea, there may be times 
when he puts himself in its way. 

Giordano Bruno 

99 

Winged by desire and thee, dear delight! 
As still the vast and succoring air I tread. 
So mounting still, on swifter pinions sped, 
I scorn the world, and heaven receives my flight, 
And if the end of Ikaros be nigh, 
I will submit, for I shall know no pain: 
And falling dead to earth, shall rise again; 
What lowly life with such high death can vie? 
Then speaks my heart from out the upper air, 
"Whither doth lead me? sorrow and despair 
Attend the rash ": And thus I make reply: — 
" Fear thou no fall, nor lofty ruin sent; 
Safely divide the clouds, and die content 
When such proud death is dealt thee from on high." 

Giordano Bruno 

100 

They were then led to the place of execution. . . . 
Amid the insults which were poured upon them as they 
passed, there were not wanting expressions of grief and 



60 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

sympathy. Some exhorted them to die with a willing 
mind, some are said to have offered them food. " Why," 
asked Savonarola, " should you offer such things to me, 
who am about to leave this life? " and again, " In the 
last hour only God is needed to comfort mortals." A 
priest named Nerotto asked him, "With what mind do 
you endure this martyrdom? " He simply replied, 
" Should I not die willingly for Him who suffered as much 
for me? " and raising up his eyes to his crucifix, he kissed 
it. 

William Clark 

101 

My children, before God, before the consecrated Host, 
with the enemy already in the convent, I confirm to you 
my doctrine. That which I have spoken I have received 
from God, and He is my witness in heaven that I do not 
lie. . . . My last counsel is this: let faith, patience and 
prayers be your arms. I leave you with anguish and grief, 
to put myself into the hands of my enemies. I know 
not whether they will take away my life; but I am certain 
that if I must die, I shall be able to aid you in heaven more 
than I have been able to do on earth. Be comforted, 
embrace the cross, and with that you will find the harbour 
of safety. 

Savonarola 

102 

. . . When the bishop urged him [John Huss] to recant, 
he turned to the people and addressed them thus: 

"These lords and bishops do counsel me that I should 
confess before you all that I have erred; which thing, if it 
might be done with the infamy and reproach of man only, 
they might, peradventure, easily persuade me to do; but 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 61 

now I am in the sight of the Lord my God, without whose 
great displeasure I could not do that which they require. 
For I well know that I never taught any of those things 
which they have falsely alleged against me, but I have 
always preached, taught, written, and thought contrary 
thereunto. Should I by this my example, trouble so many 
consciences, endued with the most certain knowledge of the 
Scriptures and of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ? 
I will never do it, neither commit any such offence, that 
I should seem to esteem this vile carcass appointed unto 
death more than their health and salvation." 

. . . When the fagots were piled around him, the Duke 
of Bavaria was so officious as to desire him to abjure. 
" No," said he, " I never preached any doctrine of an evil 
tendency; and what I taught with my lips, I now seal with 
my blood." He then said to his executioner, " You are 
now going to burn a goose (the name of Huss signifying 
goose in the Bohemian language) , but in a century you will 
have a swan whom you can neither roast nor boil." 

Foxe 

103 

My well beloved in the Lord, many causes, and especially 
the expectation of my speedy death, had made me suppose 
that the letters I recently wrote to you would be the last. 
Now that a delay is accorded — since it is permitted me to 
converse with you by letter, I write to you again, to testify, 
at least all my gratitude. In what concerns my death, 
God only knows why it is deferred, as also that of my 
very dear brother Jerome, who, I hope will die in a holy 
manner and without stain. I know that he acts and suffers 
now with more firmness than I, infirm sinner that I am. 
God has granted us much time . . . that we might, at 
last, remember that the joys of eternal life do not im- 



62 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

mediately follow this world's joys, but that it is by pass- 
ing through great tribulations that the saints enter the 
kingdom of God. Some of them have been, without shrink- 
ing, sawed in twain, others have been burned, stripped of 
their skin, buried alive, stoned, crucified, crushed between 
millstones, dragged here and there into death, precipitated 
to the bottom of the waters, strangled, cut to pieces, over- 
whelmed by outrages before their death, and tortured by 
hunger in their prisons and in their chains. Who could 
describe the torments and agonies which all the saints have 
suffered for the divine truth under the old and new cov- 
enant, and especially those who have branded the iniquity 
of priests, and who have raised their voices against it. 
It would be a strange thing at present to remain im- 
punished when attacking the perversity of priests, who will 
not endure any blame. 

John Huss 

104 

The end he [Thomas More] expected came. He was 
accused of high treason, and never permitted to go 
home again. After three or four days he was lodged in a 
prison in the Tower. . . . 

When he had been a month in the Tower, his daughter 
Margaret obtained leave to see him; but only after a long 
and wearisome suit. . . . His wife came also, and in her 
impetuous way she spoke to him as follows: 

" I marvel you, who are taken for a wise man, will so 
play the fool as to be here in a close and filthy prison, 
and be content to be shut up with rats and mice, when 
you might be allowed to be at liberty, with the good will 
of both king and council, if you would but do as the 
Bishop and the best and most learned of the realm have 
done. Seeing you might have a right fair house, your 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 63 

library, your books, gallery, garden, orchard, and all other 
necessaries so handsome about you; where you might be 
in the company of your wife, children, and household, and 
be merry. I muse what in Heaven's name you mean thus 
to tarry? " 

Her husband listened to her patiently. Then, with a 
cheerful face, he replied : " Prithee, good Mistress Alice, 
tell me one thing: Is not this house as nigh Heaven as 
my own? " 

. . . Twelve months passed away before his trial was 
over. He was judged guilty of high treason, and sentenced 
to be beheaded on Tower Hill. . . . When the procession 
reached the Tower, Margaret Roper broke through the 
guards who surrounded him with the cry, " Oh, my father ! 
my father! " He parted from her with loving words of 
comfort and at the sight of her grief the soldiers and the 
people standing round shed tears. An old servant, 
Dorothy Collie by name, made her way to him at that time 
and kissed him before them all. " 'Tis homely, but lov- 
ingly done," said More with a tender smile. . . . 

To his daughter Margaret came a letter written with a 
piece of coal the night before the execution. Among other 
words she read : " Tomorrow I long to go to God ; it were 
a day very neat and convenient. I never liked your 
manner to me better than when you kissed me last; for I 
like when daughterly love and dear charity have no cause 
to look unto worldly courtesy. Farewell, dear daughter, 
pray for me, and I will pray for you and all your friends, 
that we may meet together in heaven." 

After his death, the Constable of the Tower, Sir W. 
Kingston, came to William Roper to tell him of the last 
interview he had had with Sir Thomas More. Seeing the 
tears rolling down the Constable's cheeks as he bade him 
farewell, More had stayed him and said : " Good Mr. 



64 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Kingston, trouble not yourself, but be of good cheer. I 
will pray for you and your lady, that we may meet in 
heaven together, where we shall be merry for ever and ever." 
" In good faith, Mr. Roper," added the Constable, " I was 
ashamed of myself, that at our parting my heart was so 
weak and his so strong, that he was obliged to comfort me, 
who should rather at that time have comforted him. But 
God and cleanliness of conscience is a comfort which no 
earthly prince can give." 

Francis E. Cooke 

105 

He [Cranmer] seemed to repel the force of the fire, and 
to overlook the torture by strength of thought. 

Jeremy Collier 

106 

The next morning, being Thursday, the 29th of October 
(1618), Sir Walter Raleigh was conducted by the sheriffs 
of Middlesex, to the Old Palace Yard in Westchester, where 
there was a large scaffold erected before the parliament- 
house for his execution. . . . He mounted the scaffold with 
a cheerful countenance, and saluted the lords, knights, and 
gentlemen of his acquaintance there present. The procla- 
mation being made of an officer for silence, he began his 
speech as follows: 

" I thank God, that he has sent me to die in the light, 
and not in darkness. I likewise thank God that he 
has suffered me to die before such an assembly of honour- 
able witnesses, and not obscurely in the Tower; where, 
for the space of thirteen years together, I have been op- 
pressed with many miseries. And I return thanks, that my 
fever hath not taken me at this time, as I prayed to him 
it might not, that I might clear myself of some accusations 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 65 

unjustly laid to my charge, and leave behind me the testi- 
mony of a true heart to my king and country. . . . 

" But this I here speak, it is no time for me to flatter 
or fear princes, I, who am subject only unto death: and 
for me, who have now to do with God alone, to tell a lie 
to get the favour of the king were in vain: and yet, if 
ever I spake disloyally or dishonestly of the king, either 
to this Frenchman or any other, ever intimated the least 
thought hurtful or prejudicial of him, the Lord blot me out 
of the book of life. . . . 

"And now I entreat, that you all will join with me in 
prayer to that great God of heaven whom I have grievously 
offended, being a man full of vanity, who has lived a sin- 
ful life in such callings as have been most inducing to it: 
for I have been a soldier, sailor, and a courtier, which 
are courses of wickedness and vice; that his almighty 
goodness will forgive me; that he will cast away my sins 
from me; and that he will receive me into everlasting life: 
so I take my leave of you all, making my peace with God." 

The proclamation having been made, that all men should 
depart the scaffold, he prepared himself for death, giving 
away his hat and cape and money to some attendants who 
stood near him. When he took leave of the lords and 
other gentlemen, he entreated the lord Arundel to desire 
the king, that no scandalous writings to defame him might 
be published after his death ; concluding, " I have a long 
journey to go, therefore must take my leave." Then having 
put off his gown and doublet, he called to the headsman to 
shew him the ax, which not being suddenly done, he said: 
" I prithee, let me see it. Dost thou think that I am afraid 
of it? " Having fingered the edge of it a little, he returned 
it, and said smiling to the sheriff, " This is a sharp medicine, 
but it is a sound cure for all diseases." And having en- 
treated the company to pray to God to assist and 



66 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

strengthen him, the executioner kneeled down and asked 
him forgiveness; which Raleigh, laying his hand upon his 
shoulder, granted. Then being asked which way he 
would lay himself on the block, he answered, " So the 
heart be right, it is no matter which way the head lies." 
As he stooped to lay himself along, and reclined his head, 
his face being toward the east, the headsman spread his 
own cloak over him. After a little pause, he gave the 
sign that he was ready for the stroke by lifting up his 
hand. . . . 

William Oldys 

107 

E'en such is time! which takes on trust 
Our youth, our joys, and all we have. 
And pays us naught but age and dust; 
Which, in the dark and silent grave. 
When we have wander 'd all our ways. 
Shuts up the story of our days; 
And from this grave, this earth, this dust, 
My God shall raise me up, I trust! 

Walter Raleigh^ 

108 

You shall receive, my dear wife, my last words in these 
my last lines. My love I send you, that you may keep it 
when I am dead; and my counsel that you may remember 
it when I am no more. I would not, with my will, present 
you sorrows, dear Bess; let them go to the grave with me, 
and be buried in the dust: And seeing that it is not the 
will of God that I shall see you any more, bear my de- 
struction patiently, and with an heart like yourself. First 

1 Verse found in his Bible. Said to have been written the night 
before his death. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 67 

I send you all the thanks which my heart can conceive, 
or my words express, for your many travels and cares 
for me, which, though they have not taken effect, as you 
wished, yet my debt to you is not the less; but pay I never 
shall in this world. Secondly, I beseech you, for the love 
you bear me living, that you do not hide yourself many 
days, but by your travels seek to help my miserable for- 
times, and the right of your poor child; your mourning 
cannot avail me, who am but dust. Thirdly, you shall 
understand that my lands were conveyed to my child; 
the writings were drawn at midsummer, as divers can wit- 
ness; and I trust my blood will quench their malice who 
desired my slaughter, that they will not seek to kill you 
and yours with extreme poverty. To what friend to direct 
you, I know not; for all mine have left me in the true 
time of trial. Most sorry am I that, being surprised by 
death, I can leave you no better estate; God hath pre- 
vented all my determinations, that great God, which work- 
eth all in all. If you can live free from want, care for 
no more, for the rest is but vanity. Love God, and begin 
betimes; in him shall you find true, everlasting and end- 
less comfort. . . . Teach your son also to serve and fear 
God, whilst he is young, that the fear of God may grow 
in him. Then will God be an husband to you, and a 
father to him; an husband and a father that can never 
be taken from you. Dear wife, I beseech you for my soul's 
sake. Pay all poor men. When I am dead, no doubt but 
you will be much fought unto, for the world thinks I was 
very rich. Have a care to the fair pretences of men, for 
no greater misery can befall you in this life than to be- 
come a prey unto the world, and after to be despised. 
As for me, I am no more yours, nor you mine; death hath 
cut us asunder, and God hath divided me from the world, 
and you from me. Remember your poor child, for his 



68 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

father's sake, who loved you in his happiest estate. I sued 
for my life, but God knows it was for you and yours that 
I desired it. For know it, my dear wife, your child is 
the child of a true man who in his own respect despiseth 
death and his mishapen and ugly forms. I cannot write 
much; God knows how hardly I steal this time when all 
are asleep. And it is also time for me to separate my 
thoughts from the world. Beg my dead body, which living 
was denied you; and either lay it in Sherburne, or in 
Exeter Church, by my father and mother. I can say no 
more. 

Time and death call me away. The everlasting God, 
powerful, infinite and inscrutable, God almighty, who is 
goodness itself, the true light and life, keep you and yours, 
and have mercy upon me, and forgive my persecutors and 
false accusers, and send us to meet in his glorious King- 
dom. My dear wife, farewell; bless my boy, pray for me; 
and let my true God hold you both in his arms. 

Walter Raleigh 

109 

Give me my scallop-shell of quiet, 

My staff of faith to walk upon, 
My scrip of joy, immortal diet. 

My bottle of salvation. 
My gown of glory, hope's true gage, 
And thus I'll take my pilgrimage. 

Blood must be my body's balmer. 
While my soul, like quiet palmer, 
Trav'leth tow'rd the land of heaven; 
No other balm will here be given. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 69 

Over the silver mountains 

Where spring the nectar fountains, 

There will I kiss 

The bowl of bliss. 
And drink mine everlasting fill 
Upon every milken hill; 
My soul will be a-dry before, 
But after, it will thirst no more. 

I'll take them first 

To quench my thirst. 
And taste of nectar's suckets. 

At those clear wells 

Where sweetness dwells. 
Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets. 

Then by that happy, blestful day. 

More peaceful pilgrims I shall see, 
That have cast off their rags of clay. 

And walk apparell'd fresh like me. 

And when our bodies and all we 
Are fill'd with immortality. 
Then the bless'd parts we'll travel, 
Strow'd with rubies thick as gravel, 
Ceilings of diamond, sapphire flowers, 
High walls of coral, pearly bowers. 

From thence to heaven's bribeless hall, 

Where no corrupted voices brawl. 

No conscience molten into gold, 

No forg'd accuser bought or sold. 

No cause deferr'd, no vain-spent journey, 

For there Christ is the King's attorney; 



70 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Who pleads for all without degrees, 
And he hath angels, but no fees. 

And when the twelve grand million jury, 
Of our sins, with direful fury. 
Against our souls black verdicts give, 
Christ pleads his death, and then we live. 

Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader! 
Unblotted lawyer ! true proceeder ! 
Thou would'st salvation e'en for alms, 
Not with a bribed lawyer's palms. 

And this is mine eternal plea 

To him that made heav'n, earth and sea; 

That, since my flesh must die so soon, 

And want a head to dine next noon, 

Just at the stroke, where my veins start and spread. 

Set on my soul an everlasting head! 

Then am I ready, like a palmer fit. 
To tread those bless'd parts which before I writ 
Of death and judgment, heav'n and hell, 
Who oft doth think, must needs die well. 

Walter Raleigh 

110 

" Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man ; 
we shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in 
England as I trust shall never be put out." 

He [Hugh Latimer] received the flame as it were em- 
bracing it. After he had stroked his face with his hands, 
and as it were bathed them a little in the fire, he soon died 
as it appeared with very little pain or none. 

Execution of Hugh Latimer 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 71 

111 

Halt, passenger, take heed, what do you see — 
This tomb doth show for what some men did die: 
Here lies interr'd the dust of those who stood 
'Gainst perjury, resisting unto blood; 
Adhering to the covenants and laws 
Establishing the same; which was the cause 
Their lives were sacrificed. . . . 
. . . for them no cause was to be found 
Worthy of death; but only they were found 
Constant and steadfast, zealous, witnessing 
For the prerogatives of Christ their King. . . . 
They did endure the wrath of enemies: 
Reproaches, torments, deaths, and injuries. 
But yet they're those who from such troubles came. 
And now triumph in glory with the Lamb. 

From May 27, 1661, that the most noble Marquis of 
Argyle was beheaded, to the 17th February, 1668, that 
Mr. James Renwick suffered, were one way or other 
murdered and destroyed for the same cause about eighteen 
thousand, of whom were executed at Edinburgh about an 
hundred of noblemen, gentlemen, ministers, and others, 
noble martyrs for Jesus Christ. The most of them lies 
here. 

Epitaph 

112 

We are perhaps about to give our blood and our lives 
in the cause of our Master, Jesus Christ. It seems that 
His goodness will accept this sacrifice, as regards me, in 
expiation of my great and numberless sins, and that He will 
thus crown the past services and ardent desires of all our 



72 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Fathers here. . . . Blessed be His name for ever that He 
has chosen us, among so many better than we, to aid Him 
to bear His cross in this land! In all things, His holy 
will be done; if He wishes us to die at this moment, 
how happy the hour for us! if He wishes to spare us for 
other labours, may we still be blessed; if you hear that 
God has crowned the little we have done with death, and 
thus fulfilled our desires, bless Him: for it is for Him that 
we long to live and die, and He it is who gives us grace 
to do it. Finally, if some of us survive, I have given 
orders what they shall do. . . . As for myself, if God gives 
me grace to go to heaven, I shall pray for them, for the 
poor Hurons, and shall not forget Your Reverence. . . . 

Jean de Breheuf 

113 

In Teheran there was a man whose name was Mollah 
Mehdi Kandi. He was well-known as a pleasure-lover. 
He chased the phantom of every delight, and gratified all 
the promptings of self. All the paraphernalia of luxury 
and comfort were at his disposal. With these qualities he 
combined a high order of intelligence, a ready wit, a rare 
humour, a wide range of knowledge and useful information. 
He was a happy conversationalist, and was endowed with a 
care-free disposition. For all these things the princes and 
society admired and loved him. No reception or enter- 
tainment was ever complete without his presence, for he 
excited fun and mirth and put everybody in a good humour. 
He dressed like a dandy, and his beautiful home could 
boast of a rich and varied wardrobe with the stamp of 
the latest fashion. His home was the centre of the in- 
tellectuals of the day. He gathered around him all that 
was fashionable and polite. Poetry and literature were 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 73 

much cultivated in their meetings. He was respected and 
loved by all the younger element of the. Court and society 
circles. 

In such surroundings the Light of the Sun of Reality 
broke forth, and without any hesitation he embraced the 
religion of the Bab. Hearing about the event of the 
Fortress of Tabarassi he left everything and sallied out to 
join those who were besieged in the Fortress. 

When he was living in Teheran, there was a man by the 
name of Yousoff Bey who was not only his neighbour but 
his associate in all his gaieties and giddy pleasures. . . . 
He was the son of Beyjan Bey who brought Fatahli Shaw 
and established him upon the throne. By mere accident 
the government entrusted an important commission to 
Yousoff Bey for Mazandran. After the fulfilment of his 
official duty he returned to Teheran. One day he was in- 
vited to a reception, and in the course of conversation the 
events of the Fortress of Tabarassi were discussed by those 
who were present. When every one had finished the stock 
of ill-digested, wild information, Yousoff Bey told the fol- 
lowing story. . . . 

As I knew and loved Mollah Mehdi from childhood, 
and was greatly attached to him, when I arrived at Mazan- 
dran, after finishing my mission, I went to the camp of the 
Prince and Abbas Kuli Khan. With a large army they had 
set siege to the Fortress without any evident result. As 
these two generals were my friends, I got from them a 
military permit to pass through the ranks of the soldiers 
and visit my old friend in the Fortress. My first object 
was to go there and free him from the horrors of starva- 
tion and death, that, released from all these sufferings 
and tribulations, he might return to Teheran, and infuse in 
us the old spirit of fun and delight. When I approached 
the Fortress I sent a man ahead of me to knock at the gate 



74 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

and inform the guard that we were on a peaceful mission, 
desiring to meet Mollah Mehdi Kandi. But he saw me 
from a rampart, and, recognizing me, he ran down and 
opened the gate and I entered. 

At once I was extremely touched by his outward ap- 
pearance. He had a white, simple nightcap on his head, 
and wore a long, white robe made of cheap cloth: his feet 
were bare. A long, ponderous sword hung on a curious 
girdle wrought in iron. I was so affected by this that I 
sat down and wept. At last, controlling my tears and pity, 
I said to him: 

" I have come here to free thee from these evil surround- 
ings. Since I have seen thee my heart is torn to pieces. 
I cannot see thee in this condition. Come, friend, come 
— let us go back to Teheran, where the merry company and 
the laughing friends await thee." 

He laughed: then immediately became serious and said: 

"Man! What art thou talking about? I have come 
here to sacrifice my life, not to save it! But if thou art 
a sincere friend of mine, come and listen to me! These 
fleeting days shall pass away; all the pleasures, joys and 
happiness of this ephemeral world shall come to an end, 
and, ere long, thou shalt die and go under the earth. 
Therefore come with me and join thy hand with mine and 
sacrifice thy life in this Divine Arena! " 

I answered: "Really, I may just as well believe that 
thou hast lost thy reason! What kind of counsel is this 
that thou art giving me? " 

He said : " The enemies of Hossein attributed the same 
thing to him on the Plain of Karbela. If thou didst realize 
thou wouldst see that thou hast no better friend than I in 
this wide world." 

In short, I found that all my persistence and persuasion 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 75 

could not move him. I was going to speak again when he 
said: 

"Please! Don't push me against the wall! I have 
fully made up my mind. God forbid that I should leave 
this Fortress. I have found this place so that through 
self-sacrifice I may attain to the Most Great Bounty." 

I said : " What power is in this place that keeps thee so 
fast? " 

He answered, with the fire of enthusiasm in his eyes: 

" The power of self-sacrifice ! " 

For a long time I was at a loss what to say. Finally 
I said: "Mollah Mehdi! If thou dost not desire to 
come out for thy sake have pity on thy children and thy 
wife. On the eve of my departure from Teheran thy wife 
came to me with thy little boy and entreated me to do my 
utmost to release thee. Thy children were crying all the 
time, saying : * We want our father ! We want our 
father! ' Their crying and lamentation are yet ringing in 
my ears. Come friend, have pity on thy little children and 
thy wife. Listen to the pleadings of their young, innocent 
voices. Dost thou not hear them? "... 

After a few moments of silence, during which deep 
emotion played upon his face, he thundered out with a 
resonant voice: 

"Man! What do I want to do with wife and children! 
I have given them as trusts into the Hands of God ! He is 
their Father! Go, go! and leave me to my fate! Go and 
live with thy wife and children! Go and chase the will 
o' the wisp of pleasure for a few days longer ! Go and be 
satisfied with these phantasmal appearances! Mine, mine, 
is the chalice of self-sacrifice! Mine, mine is the wine of 
martyrdom! Mine, mine is the fire of self-immolation! " 

Abdul Baha 



76 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

114 

. . . An old and blood-bespattered man, half -dead from 
the wounds inflicted but a few hours before; a man lying 
in the cold and dirt, without sleep for fifty-five nerve- 
wrecking hours, without food for nearly as long, with the 
dead bodies of two sons almost before his eyes, the piled 
corpses of his seven slain comrades near and far, a wife 
and a bereaved family listening in vain, and a Lost Cause, 
the dream of a lifetime, lying dead in his heart. Around 
him was a group of bitter, inquisitive Southern aristocrats 
and their satellites, headed by one of the foremost leaders 
of subsequent secession. 

" Who sent you — who sent you? " these inquisitors in- 
sisted. 

" No man sent me — I acknowledge no master in human 
form! " 

" What was your object in coming? " 

" We came to free the slaves." 

" How do you justify your acts? " 

"You are guilty of a great wrong against God and 
humanity and it would be perfectly right for any one to 
interfere with you so far as to free those you wilfully and 
wickedly hold in bondage. I think I did right; and that 
others will do right who interfere with you at any time 
and at all times. I hold that the Golden Rule, ' Do unto 
others as ye would that others should do imto you,' applies 
to all who would help others to gain their liberty." . . . 

" Do you consider this a religious movement? " 

" It is in my opinion the greatest service man can render 
to God." 

" Do you consider yourself an instrument in the hands 
of Providence? " 

"I do." 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 77 

"Upon what principles do you justify your acts?" 

" Upon the Golden Rule. I pity the poor in bondage 
that have none to help them. That is why I am here; 
not to gratify any personal animosity, revenge, or vindic- 
tive spirit. It is my sympathy with the oppressed and the 
wronged, that are as good as you and as precious in the 
sight of God." . . . 

" Who are your advisers in this movement? " 

" I have numerous sympathizers throughout the entire 
North. ... I want you to understand that I respect the 
rights of the poorest and weakest of coloured people, op- 
pressed by the slave system, just as much as I do those of 
the most wealthy and powerful. That is the idea that has 
moved me and that alone. We expected no reward except 
satisfaction of endeavouring to do for those in distress and 
greatly oppressed as we would be done by. The cry of dis- 
tress of the oppressed is my reason, and the only thing that 
prompted me to come here." . . . 

" Brown, suppose you had every nigger in the United 
States, what would you do with them? " 

" Set them free." ... 

" To set them free would sacrifice the life of every man 
in this commimity." 

"I do not think so." 

"I know it; I think you are fanatical." 

" And I think you are fanatical. Whom the gods would 
destroy they first make mad, and you are mad." . . . 

Governor Wise interrupted : " Mr. Brown, the silver 
of your hair is reddened by the blood of crime, and you 
should eschew these hard words and think upon eternity. 
You are suffering from wounds perhaps fatal; and should 
you escape death from these causes, you must submit to 
a trial which may involve death. Your confessions justify 
the presumption that you will be found guilty; and even 



78 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

now you are committing a felony mider the laws of Vir- 
ginia, by uttering sentiments like these. It is better you 
should turn your attention to your eternal future than be 
dealing in denunciations which can only injure you." 

John Brown replied : " Governor, I have from all ap- 
pearances not more than fifteen or twenty years the start 
of you in the journey to that eternity of which you kindly 
warn me; and whether my time here shall be fifteen months, 
or fifteen days, or fifteen hours, I am equally prepared 
to go. There is an eternity . behind and an eternity be- 
fore; and this little spark in the centre, however long, is 
but comparatively a minute. The difference between your 
tenure and mine is trifling, and I therefore tell you to be 
prepared. I am prepared. You have a heavy responsi- 
bility, and it behooves you to prepare more than it does 
me." 

TV, E. Burghardt Du Bois 

115 

At eleven o'clock on Friday, December 2nd, John Brown 
was brought out of the jail accompanied by Sheriff 
Campbell and assistants, and Capt. Avis, the jailer. 

Sheriff Campbell bid the prisoner farewell in his cell, 
the latter returning thanks for the sheriff's kindness, and 
speaking of Capt. Pate as a brave man. 

The prisoner was then taken to the cell of Copeland 
and Green ; he told them to stand up like men and not to be- 
tray their friends; he then handed them a quarter each, 
saying he had no more use for money and bid them adieu. 
He then visited Cook and Coppie, who were chained to- 
gether, and remarked to Cook, " You have made false 
statements." Cook asked, " What do you mean? " 
Brown answered, "Why, by stating that I sent you to 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 79 

Harper's Ferry." Cook replied, " Did you not tell me at 
Pittsburg to come to Harper's Ferry and see if Forbes 
had made any disclosures?" Brown: "No, sir; you 
know I protested against your coming." Cook replied: 
" Capt. Brown, we remember differently," at the same time 
dropping his head. 

Brown then turned to Coppie, and said, " Coppie, you 
also made false statements, but I am glad to hear that you 
have contradicted them. Stand up like a man." He also 
handed him a quarter. He shook both by the hand, and 
they parted. 

The prisoner was then taken to Stephens' cell and they 
kindly interchanged greetings. Stephens said, " Good-bye, 
Captain, I know you are going to a better land." Brown 
replied, " I know I am." Brown told him to bear up and 
not betray his friends, giving him a quarter. 

The prisoner then told the Sheriff he was ready, his 
arms were pinioned, and with a black slouch hat on, and 
the same clothes he wore during the trial, he proceeded to 
the door, apparently calm and cheerful. . . . 

On the way to the scaffold Mr. Saddler, an undertaker, 
who was in the wagon with him remarked : " Capt. Brown, 
you are a game man." He answered, " Yes, I was so trained 
up ; it was one of the lessons of my mother — but it is hard 
to part from friends, though newly made." He then re- 
marked, " This is a beautiful country ; I never had the 
pleasure of seeing it before." 

As he came out the six companies of infantry and one 
troop of horse, with General Taliaferro and his entire 
staff, were deploying in front of the jail, whilst an open 
wagon with a pine box, in which was a fine oak coffin, 
was waiting for him. 

Brown looked around and spoke to several persons he 
recognized, and walking down the steps, took a seat on 



80 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

the cofl&n box along with the jailer, Avis. . . . Brown was 
accompanied by no ministers, he desiring no religious serv- 
ices. . . . 

On reaching the gallows he observed Mr. Hunter and 
Mayor Green standing near, to whom he said, " Gentlemen, 
good-bye," his voice not faltering. 

The prisoner walked up the steps firmly, and was the 
first man on the gallows. Avis and Sheriff Campbell stood 
by his side, and after shaking hands and bidding an af- 
fectionate adieu, he thanked them for their kindness. 
When the cap was put over his face, and the rope around 
his neck, Avis asked him to step forward on the trap. He 
replied, "You must lead me, I cannot see." The rope 
was adjusted, and the military order given, " Not ready 
yet." The soldiers marched, countermarched and took 
position as if an enemy were in sight, and were thus oc- 
cupied for nearly ten minutes, the prisoner standing all the 
time. Avis inquired if he was not tired. Brown said, 
"No, not tired; but don't keep me waiting longer than is 
necessary." 

While on the scaffold. Sheriff Campbell asked him if he 
would take a handkerchief in his hand to drop as a signal 
when he was ready. He replied, " No, I do not want it — 
but do not detain me any longer than is absolutely neces- 

^* Contemporary Account of the Event 

116 

My Dearly Beloved Wife, Sons and Daughters, Every one — 
As I now begin what is probably the last letter I shall 
ever write to any of you, I conclude to write you all at 
the same time. ... I am waiting the hour of my public 
murder with great composure of mind, and cheerfulness, 
feeling the strongest assurance that in no other possible 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 81 

way could I be used to so much advance the cause of God 
and of humanity, and that nothing that either I or all my 
family have sacrificed or suffered will be lost. The re- 
flection that a wise and merciful as well as just and holy 
God rules not only the affairs of this world but of all 
worlds, is a rock to set our feet upon under all circum- 
stances, even those most severely trying ones into which 
our own follies and wrongs have placed us. I have now 
no doubt but that our seeming disaster will ultimately re- 
sult in the most glorious success. So my dear shattered 
and broken family, be of good cheer, and believe and trust 
in God, with all your heart and with all your soul, for 
he doeth all things well. Do not feel ashamed on my ac- 
count; nor for one moment despair of the cause, or grow 
weary of well doing. I bless God; I never felt stronger 
confidence in the certain and near approach of a bright 
morning and glorious day. . . . 

John Brown 

117 

Now these are my ideas. They constitute a part of my- 
self. I cannot divest myself of them, nor would I if I 
could. If you think that you can crush out these ideas 
that are gaining ground more and more every day, if you 
think that you can crush them out by sending us to the 
gallows, if you would once more have people suffer the 
penalty of death because they dare to tell the truth, then 
I say you may call your hangman and turn me and my 
friends over to him. We have not told anything but the 
truth. I defy you to show us where we have told a lie. 
I shall die proudly and defiantly in the Cause of Truth, 
as so many martyrs have done whom I could name to you 
and among them Christ. Why, the number cannot be 



82 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

even estimated of those who have fallen in this path, and 
we are ready. 

August Spies 

118 

... I have no fear nor shrinking; I have seen death so 
often that it is not strange or fearful to me. . . . 

I thank God for this ten weeks' quiet before the end. 
. . . Life has always been hurried and full of difficulty. 
. . . This time of rest has been a great mercy. . . . 

They have all been very kind to me here. But this I 
would say, standing as I do in view of God and eternity, 
I realize that patriotism is not enough. I must have no 
hatred or bitterness toward any one. . . . 

Good-bye! We shall meet again. 

Edith Cavell 

119 

... He [Karl Liebknecht] got what belonged to him. 
He got death. What better thing could come to man 
than the right kind of death? What kind of life can equal 
some kinds of death? He didn't go out looking for what 
he got. But something went out looking for and got him. 
. . . The super-saviours can be got on very easy terms 
if you plan right. But after you've done them, you find 
they trouble you more than ever when you've nailed their 
coffins down. John Brown's body song has inspired the 
heroism of races. Karl Liebknecht's soul song will invoke 
the cataclysm of an international brotherhood. . . . We 
are already facing the traditions of a proletarian pilgrim- 
age. His name is becoming the talisman of a noble inten- 
tion. It has assumed such realities of reassurance as to 
strengthen every latent passion for social amelioration. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 83 

Some men seem to live only to die. He, on the contrary, 
died only to live. As he fell back in that mob done to death 
by the implements of a barbarian past, I can imagine his 
old father in the shadows with outstretched arms seizing 
him and crying, " Well done, Karl ! It's a blessed day. 
You've put it on the calendar for ever." It was worth 
while. Nothing seemed so like Karl's life as his death. 
And nothing seemed so like his death as his life. They 
must be proud of each other. 

Horace Trauhel 

120 

Servant of God, well done! well hast thou fought 

The better fight, who single hast maintained 

Against revolted multitudes the cause 

Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms, 

And for the testimony of truth hast borne 

Universal reproach, far worse to bear 

Than violence; for this was all thy care — 

To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds 

Judg'd thee perverse. . . . 

John Milton 

121 

When a man dies faithfully and laudably ... it is 
still death he is avoiding. For he submits to some part of 
death, for the very purpose of avoiding the whole. . . . 
He submits to the separation of soul and body, lest the ^ 
soul be separated from God. . . . Wherefore death is in- 
deed . . . good to none while it is being actually suffered 
. . . but it is meritoriously endured for the sake of re- 
taining or winning what is good. 

St. Augustine 



84 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

122 

I understand the large hearts of heroes, 

The courage of present times and all times . . . 

The disdain and calmness of martyrs, 

The mother of old, condemned for a witch, burnt with dry 

wood, her children gazing on . . . 
I am the mashed fireman with breast-bone broken. 
Tumbling walls buried me in their debris. 
Heat and smoke I inspired, I heard the yelling shouts of 

my comrades, 
I heard the distant click of their picks and shovels. 
They have cleared the beams away, they tenderly lift me 

forth. . . . 

Walt Whitman 

123 

We worship the destroyer. We despise or at least ignore 
the builder. . . . You look with awe upon a battlefield. 
Do you not look with as much awe upon a tunnel? Here 
is an honest battle. A battle with the rocks. . . . Here 
is a battle in which no other takes up his arms against a 
brother. Yet this battle, too, has its victims. And you 
look on and think and say nothing. . . . You look down 
into these holes in the groimd and your pulse is undis- 
turbed. . . . What is the matter? . . . 

Some men die that you may live. Some on scafifolds 
Some on crosses. Some on battlefields. Some in tunnels 
Why should not the tunnel be as holy as the cross? . . 
You can understand Jesus on the cross. You can under 
stand Savonarola burned at the stake. You can under 
stand John Brown, executed at Harper's Ferry. Why do 
you fail to understand this somebody sacrificed in the 
tunnel? I do not say that the cross and the stake and the 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 85 

scaffold have tricked you. But I do say that the tunnel 
has tricked you. . . . For if you fail to understand the 
tunnel you deny all martyrdom. . . . 

He died humbly crushed underneath a rock. They have 
brought him out of the ground. His face is pale but 
satisfied. Your city of millions will not stay in its heavy 
round to regard his anonymous visage. Yet this unknown 
man has saved your city. But for him your city could 
not exist. All labour lies there prostrate in his inert form. 
Come out of your churches, all of you, and worship here. 
Leave your creeds behind. This is creed enough. Wor- 
ship here. Here is religion enough. 

Horace Traubel 

124 

... the dignity of death — the only earthly dignity 
that is not artificial — the only safe one. The others are 
traps that beguile to humiliation. 

Death — the only immortal who treats us all alike, whose 
pity and whose peace and whose refuge are for all — the 
soiled and the pure — the rich and the poor — the loved 
and the unloved. 

Mark Twain 

125 

The ways of Death are soothing and serene 
And all the words of Death are grave and sweet. 
From camp and church, the fireside and the street. 
She beckons forth — and strife and song have been. 

A summer night descending cool and green 
And dark on daytime's dust and stress and heat, 
The ways of Death are soothing and serene 
And all the words of Death are grave and sweet. 



86 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

glad and sorrowful, with triumphant mien 
And radiant faces look upon and greet 
This last of all your lovers, and to meet 
Her kiss, the Comforter's, your spirit lean — 
The ways of Death are soothing and serene. 

William E, Henley 

126 

thou the last fulfilment of life. Death, my death, come 
and whisper to me! 

Day after day have I kept watch for thee; for thee have 
I borne the joys and pangs of life. 

All that I am, that I have, that I hope and all my 
love have ever flowed towards thee in depth of secrecy. 
One final glance from thine eyes and my life will be ever 
thine own. 

The flowers have been woven and the garland is ready 
for the bridegroom. After the wedding the bride shall 
leave her home and meet her lord in the solitude of night. 

Rabindranath Tagore 

127 

1 have got my leave. Bid me farewell, my brothers! 
I bow to you all and take my departure. 

Here I give back the keys of my door — and I give up 
all claims to my house. I only ask for last kind words 
from you. 

We were neighbours for long, but I received more than 
I could give. Now the day has dawned and the lamp 
that lit my dark corner is out. A summons has come and 
I am ready for my journey. 

Rabindranath Tagore 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 87 



128 



Ah, well, friend Death, good friend thou art. 

Thy only fault thy lagging gait. 
Mistaken pity in thy heart 

For timorous ones that bid thee wait. 

Do quickly all thou hast to do, 

Nor I nor mine will hindrance make; 

I shall be free when thou art through; 
I grudge thee nought that thou must take! 

Helen Hunt Jackson 



129 

... I hold 
That if it be 
Less than enough to any soul to know 
Itself immortal, immortality 
In all its boundless spaces will not find 
A place designed 
So small, so low. 
That to a fittting home such soul can go. 

Out to the earthward brink 
Of that great tideless sea 
Light from Christ's garments streams. 
Cowards who fear to tread such beams 
The angels can but pity when they sink. 
Believing thus, I joy although I lie in dust. 
I joy, not that I ask or choose. 
But simply that I must. 

I love and fear not; and I cannot lose 



88 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

One instant, this great certainty of peace. 
Long as God ceases not, I cannot cease; I must arise. 

Helen Hunt Jackson 

130 

Let me live out my years in heat of blood! 
Let me die drunken with the dreamer's wine! 
Let me not see this soul-house built of mud 
Go toppling to the dust — a vacant shrine! 

Let me go quickly like a candle light 
Snuffed out just at the heyday of its glow! 
Give me high noon — and let it then be night! 
Thus would I go. 

And grant me, when I face the grisly Thing, 
One haughty cry to pierce the gray Perhaps! 
Let me be as a time-swept fiddlestring 
That feels the Master-Melody — and snaps! 

John G. Neihardt 



131 

Give me to die unwitting of the day. 
And stricken in Life's brave heat, with senses clear: 
Not swathed and couched until the lines appear 
Of Death's wan mask upon the withering clay, 
But as that old man eloquent made way 
From earth, a nation's conclave hushed anear; 
Or as the chief whose fates, that he may hear 
The victory, one glorious moment stay. 
Or, if not thus, then with no cry in vain, 
No ministrant beside to ward and weep, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 89 

Hand upon helm I would my quittance gain 
In some wild turmoil of waters deep, 
And sink content into a dreamless sleep 
(Spared grave and shroud) below the ancient main. 

E, C, Stedman 

132 

Death, thou'rt a cordial old and rare: 
Look how compounded, with what care! 
Time got his wrinkles reaping thee 
Sweet herbs from all antiquity. 

David to thy distillage went, 
Keats, and Gotama excellent, 
Omar Khayyam, and Chaucer bright, 
And Shakespeare for a king-delight. 

Then, Time, let not a drop be spilt: 
Hand me the cup whene'er thou wilt; 
'Tis thy rich stirrup-cup to me; 
I'll drink it down right smilingly. 

Sidney Lanier 

133 

So mayst thou die as I do; fear and pain 
Being subdued. Farewell! Farewell! Farewell! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley 

134 

Natural death is as it were a haven and a rest to us 
after long navigation. And the noble Soul is like a good 
mariner; for he, when he draws near to port, lowers his 
sail and enters it softly with gentle steerage. . . . And 



90 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

herein we have from our own nature a great lesson of 
suavity; for in such a death as this there is no grief nor 
any bitterness; but as a ripe apple is lightly and with- 
out violence loosened from its branch, so our soul with- 
out grieving departs from the body in which it hath been. 

Dante 

135 

Happy, Agricola! Not only in the splendour of your 
life, but in the seasonableness of your death. With resig- 
nation and cheerfulness, from the testimony of those who 
were present in your last moments, did you meet your 
fate. ... If there is any place for the departed spirits 
of the righteous; if, as philosophers suppose, exalted souls 
do not perish with the body, may you repose in peace, 
and call us, your household, from vain regret ... to the 
contemplation of your virtues which allow no place for 
mourning. 

Tacitus 

136 

. . . From that time, such as he had been in all combats, 
serene, self-possessed, and occupied without anxiety only 
with what was necessary to sustain them — such also he 
was in that last conflict. Death appeared to him no more 
frightful, pale and languishing, than amid the fires of 
battle and in the prospect of victory. While sobbings 
were heard all around him, he continued, as if another 
than himself were their object, to give his orders; and if 
he forbade their weeping, it was not because it was a dis- 
tress to him, but simply a hindrance. 

The manner in which he began to acquit himself of his 
religious duties, deserves to be recounted throughout the 
world; not because it was particularly remarkable; but 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 91 

rather because it was, so to speak, not such; for it seemed 
singular that a Prince so much under the eye of the world, 
should furnish so little to spectators. Do not then, expect 
those magniloquent words which serve to reveal, if not a 
concealed pride, at least an agitated soul, which combats 
or dissembles its secret trouble. The Prince of Conde 
knew not how to utter such pompous sentences; in death, 
as in life, truth ever formed his true grandeur. 

... All were in tears, and weeping aloud. The Prince 
alone was unmoved; trouble came not into that asylum 
where he had cast himself. . . . Tranquil in the arms of 
his God, he waited for his salvation, and implored His sup- 
port until he finally ceased to breathe. . , . 

James Benigne Bossuet 

137 

So live, that when thy summons comes to join 
The innumerable caravan, which moves 
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take 
His chamber in the silent halls of death. 
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, 
Scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothed 
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, 
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. 

William Cullen Bryant 

138 

I ask not that my bed of death 

From bands of greedy heirs be free; 

For these besiege the latest breath 

Of fortune's favoured sons, not me. . . • 



92 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

I ask but that my death may find 
The freedom to my life denied; 
Ask but the folly of mankind 
Then, then at last, to quit my side. 

Spare me the whispering, crowded room, 
The friends who come, and gape, and go; 
The ceremonious air of gloom — 
All, which makes death a hideous show! 

Nor bring, to see me cease to live. 
Some doctor full of phrase and fame, 
To shake his sapient head, and give 
The ill he cannot cure a name. 

Nor fetch, to take the accustom'd toll 
Of the poor sinner bound for death, 
His brother-doctor of the soul, 
To canvass with official breath 

The future and its viewless things — 

That undiscovered mystery 

Which one who feels death's winnowing wings >^ 

Must needs read clearer, sure, than hel 

Bring none of these, but let me be. 
While all around in silence lies. 
Moved to the window near, and see 
Once more, before my dying eyes, 

Bathed in the sacred dews of morn 

The wide aerial landscape spread — 

The world which was ere I was bom. 

The world which lasts when I apa deadj , . . 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 93 

There let me gaze, till I become 
In soul, with what I gaze on, wed! 
To feel the miiverse my home; 
To have before my mind — instead 

Of the sick room, the mortal strife, 
The turmoil for a little breath — 
The pure eternal course of life. 
Not human combatings with death! 

Thus, feeling, gazing, might I grow 
Composed, refreshed, ennobled, clear; 
Then willing let my spirit go 
To work or wait elsewhere or here. 

Matthew Arnold 

139 

Now while I sat in the day and looked forth, 

Now in the close of the day with its light and the fields of 

spring, and the farmers preparing their crops. 
In the large unconscious scenery of my land with its lake 

and forests, ... 
Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift passing, 

and the voices of children and women . . . 

. . . lo, then and there, 
Falling upon them all and among them all, enveloping me 

with the rest, 
Appeared the cloud, appeared the long black trail. 
And I knew death, its thought, and the sacred knowledge of 

death. 

Then with the knowledge of death as walking one side of 
me. 



94 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

And the thought of death close walking the other side of 

me, 
And I in the middle as with companions, and as holding 

the hands of companions, 
I fled forth to the hiding receiving night that talks not, 
Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in 

the dimness. 
To the solemn shadowy cedars and ghostly pines so still. 

And the singer so shy to the rest received me. 

The gray-brown bird I know received us comrades three, 

And he sang the carol of death, and a verse for him I love. 

From deep secluded recesses. 

From the fragrant cedars and the ghostly pines so still, 

Came the carol of the bird. 

And the charm of the carol wrapt me. 

As I held as if by their hands my comrades in the night, 

And the voice of my spirit tallied the song of the bird. 

Come, lovely and soothing Death, 

Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving. 

In the day, in the night, to all, to each. 

Sooner or later delicate Death. 

Praised be the fathomless universe. 

For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious; 
And for love, sweet love — but praise! praise! praise! 
For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death. 

Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet. 
Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome? 
Then I chant it for thee — / glorify thee above all; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 95 

/ bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come 
unfalteringly. 

Approach, Strong Deliveress, 

When it is so — when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing 

the dead. 
Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee. 
Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death. 

From me to thee glad serenades. 

Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee — adornments and 

feastings for thee. 
And the sights of the open landscape, and the high-spread 

sky, are fitting. 
And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night. 

The night, in silence, under many a star; 

The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose 

voice I know; 
And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veiled Death, 
And the body gratefully nestling close to thee. 

Over the tree-tops I float thee a song! 

Over the rising and sinking waves — over the myriad fields 

and the prairies wide; 
Over the dense packed cities all, and the teeming wharves 

and ways, 
I float this carol with joy, with joy to thee, Death. 

Walt Whitman 

140 

Thou Eternal One, we who are doomed to die lift 
up our souls to thee for strength, for Death has passed us 



96 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

in the throng of men and touched us, and we know that 
at some turn of our pathway he stands waiting to take us 
by the hand and lead us — we know not whither. We 
praise thee that to us he is no more an enemy but thy 
great angel and our friend, who alone can open for some 
of us the prison house of pain and misery. . . . Yet we are 
but children, afraid of the dark and the unknown, and we 
dread the parting from the life that is so sweet and from 
the loved ones who are so dear. 

Grant us of thy mercy a valiant heart, that we may tread 
the road with head uplifted and a smiling face. May 
we do our work to the last with a wholesome joy, and 
live our lives with an added tenderness because the days 
of love are short. ... If our spirit droops in loneliness, 
uphold us by thy companionship. When all the voices of 
love grow faint and drift away, thy everlasting arms will 
still be there. Thou art the father of our spirits; from 
thee we have come; to thee we go. . . . 

Walter Rauschenbusch 



PART II 
IMMORTAL LIFE 



There is, I know not how, in the minds of men, a certain 
presage as it were, of a future existence. And this takes 
the deepest root, and is most discoverable in the greatest 
geniuses and most exalted souls, 

Cicero 



IMMORTAL LIFE 



141 



Where there is eternal light, in the world where the sun 
is placed, in that immortal, imperishable world, place me, 
Sonia ! Where the secret place of heaven is, where these 
mighty waters are, there make me immortal! Where life 
is free, . . . where the worlds are radiant, there make 
me immortal! . . . Where there is happiness and delight, 
where joy and pleasure reside, where the desires of our 
desire are attained, there make me immortal! 

Hindus 

142 

Man never dies. The soul inhabits the body for a time, 
and leaves it again. The soul is myself; the body is only 
my dwelling place. Birth is not birth: there is a soul al- 
ready existent when the body comes to it. Death is not 
death: the soul merely departs and the body falls. It is 
because men see only their bodies that they love life and 
hate death. 

Buddhist Scriptures 

143 

The soul is not born; it does not die. It was not pro- 
duced from any one, nor was any produced from it. 
Unborn, eternal, it is not slain, though the body is slain. 

Buddhist Scriptures 
99 



100 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

144 

The soul is the principle of life which the Sovereign 
Wisdom employed to animate bodies. Matter is inert and 
perishable. The soul thinks, acts and is immortal. . . . 
There is another invisible, external existence superior to 
this visible one, which does not perish when all things 
perish. 

Bhagavadgita 
145 

The God of the Dead waits enthroned in immortal light 
to welcome the good into his kingdom of joy: to the homes 
he had gone to prepare for them, where the One Being 
dwells beyond the stars. 

Vedas 
146 

The soul lives after the body dies. The soul passes 
through the gate; he makes a way in the darkness to his 
Father. He has pierced the heart of evil, to do the things 
of his Father. He has come a prepared Spirit. He says: 
Hail, thou Self -Created ! Do not turn me away. I am one 
of thy types of earth. I have not privily done evil against 
any man; I have not been idle; I have not made any to 
weep; I have not murdered; I have not defrauded; I have 
not committed adultery. I am pure. 

(The Judge of the Dead answers) Let the soul pass 
on. He is without sin; he lives upon truth. He has made 
his delight in doing what men say, and what the gods 
wish. He has given food to the hungry, drink to the 
thirsty, and clothes to the naked. His lips are pure, and 
his hands are pure. His heart weighs right in the balance. 
The departed fought on earth the battle of the good gods, 
as his Father, the Lord of the Invisible World, had com- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 101 

manded him. God, the protector of him who has 
brought his cry unto thee, make it well with him in the 
world of Spirits. 

Egyptian Book of the Dead 

147 

These have found grace in the eyes of the Great God. 
They dwell in the abodes of glory, where the heavenly life 
is led. The bodies which they have abandoned will repose 
for ever in their tombs, while they will enjoy the presence 
of the Great God. 

Writing in Egyptian Tomb 

148 

The virtuous man rejoices in this world, and he will re- 
joice in the next world: in both worlds hath he joy. He 
rejoices, he exults, seeing the virtue of his deeds. 

As kindred, friends and dear ones salute him who hath 
travelled far and returned home safe, so will good deeds 
welcome him who goes from this world and enters an- 
other, 

Buddha 
149 

. . . Souls risen from the grave will know each other, 
and say. That is my father, or my brother, my wife, or my 
sister. 

The man who has constantly contended against evil, 
morally and physically, outwardly and inwardly, may fear- 
lessly meet death; well assured that radiant Spirits will 
lead him across the luminous bridge into a paradise of 
eternal happiness. 

Zoroaster 



102 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

150 

Verily, man's lot is cast amid destruction. Save those 
who believe and do the things which be right, and enjoin 
truth, and enjoin steadfastness on each other. 

Verily, we have made all that is on earth as its adorn- 
ment, that we might make trial who among mankind would 
excel in works. 

All that is with you passeth away, but that which is 
with God abideth. . . . 

The grave is the first stage of the journey into eternity. 

Mohammed 
151 

They live, who lie in the grave. 

Sophocles 
152 

'Tis true, 'tis certain; man though dead retains 
Part of himself; the immortal mind remains. 

Hom£r 
153 

The soul of the deceased, although it live 
Indeed no longer, yet doth it still retain 
A consciousness which lasts for ever, lodged 
In the eternal scene of its abode. 
The liquid ether. 

Euripides 

154 

The immortality of the soul has been established beyond 
the reach of doubt. . . . But to understand its real nature, 
we must look at the soul not . . . after it has been marred 
by its associations with the body, and by other evils; but 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 103 

we must carefully contemplate it by the aid of reasoning, 
when it appears in unsullied purity; and then its sur- 
passing beauty will be discovered. . . . We have given a 
true account of the soul in its present appearance. But 
we have looked at it in a state like that of the sea-god 
Glaukos, whose original nature can no longer be readily 
discerned by the eye, because the old members of his body 
have been either broken off, or crushed and in every way 
marred by the action of the waves, and because extraneous 
substances, like shell-fish and seaweed and stones, have 
grown to him, so that he bears a closer resemblance to any 
wild beast whatever than to his natural self. The soul, 
as we are contemplating it, has been reduced to a similar 
state by a thousand evils. But we ought to fix our atten- 
tion on one part of it exclusively ... on its love of 
wisdom, that we may learn to what it clings, and with 
w^hat it desires to have intercourse, in view of its close con- 
nexion with the divine, the immortal, and the eternal, and 
what it would become if it invariably pursued the 
divine. . . . 

Plato 

155 

Whatsoever that be within us that feels, thinks, and 
animates, is something celestial, divine, and consequently 
imperishable. 

Aristotle 

156 

My body must descend to the place ordained, but my 
soul will not descend; being a thing immortal, it will 
ascend on high, where it will enter a heavenly abode. 

Heraclitus 



104 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

157 

When thou shah have laid aside thy body, thou shalt rise, 
freed from mortality, and become a god of the kindly skies. 

Pythagoras 
158 

" In what way shall we bury you," said Crito. 

" However you wish," [Socrates] replied, " only you 
must catch me first and see that I don't slip away. . . . 
Why, my friends, I can't convince Crito that I am this 
Socrates, the one who talks with you and argues at length. 
He thinks I am that other whom presently he shall see lying 
dead, and so he asks how he shall bury me. All the words 
I have spoken to show that when I drink the poison I shall 
no longer remain with you, but shall go away to some 
blessed region of the happy dead — all my words of com- 
fort for y®u and for myself are thrown away on him. . . . 
I would have Crito bear the matter more lightly, and not 
be troubled at my supposed sufferings when he sees my 
body burned or interred, nor say at the funeral that he is 
laying out Socrates, or carrying Socrates to the grave, or 
burying him. For you must know, my dearest Crito, that 
wrong words are not only a fault in themselves, but in- 
sinuate evil into the soul. Be brave, therefore, and say 
you are burying my body; and indeed you may bury it 
as seems good to you, and as custom directs. . . . 

" We are permitted, nay, obliged to pray the gods to 
grant us a happy journey from this world to the other. 
So I pray, and so may it be." 

Plato 
159 

Let us hasten — let us fly — 
Where the lovely meadows lie; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 105 

Where the living waters flow; 
Where the roses bloom and blow. 
Heirs of immortality, 
Segregated, safe and pure, 
Easy, sorrowless, secure; 
Since our earthly course is run, 
We behold a brighter sun. 
Holy lives — a holy vow — 
Such rewards await us now. 

Aristophanes 

160 

Then whosoever have been of good courage to the abid- 
ing steadfast thrice on either side of death, and have re- 
frained their souls from all iniquity, travel the road of 
Zeus unto the tower of Kronos; there around the islands 
of the blest the ocean breezes blow, and golden flowers 
are glowing, some from the land on trees of splendour, 
and some the water feedeth, with wreaths whereof they en- 
twine their hands. ... By happy lot travel all imto an 
end that giveth them rest from toils. 

Pindar 

161 

glorious day, when I shall remove from this confused 
crowd to join the divine assembly of souls! For I shall go 
not only to meet great men, but also my own son. His 
spirit, looking back upon me, departed to that place whither 
he knew that I should soon come; and he has never deserted 
me. If I iiave born his loss with courage, it is because 
I consoled myself with the thought that our separation 
would not be for long. 

Cato 



106 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

162 

From this life I depart as from a temporary lodging, 
not as from a home. For nature has assigned it to us as an 
inn to sojourn in, not a place of habitation. glorious 
day! when I shall depart to that divine company and as- 
semblage of spirits, and quit this troubled and polluted 
scene. ... If I am wrong in this, that I believe the souls 
of men to be immortal, I willingly delude myself: nor do 
I desire that this mistake, in which I take pleasure, should 
be wrested from me as long as I live. . . . 

Cicero 

163 

When I consider the faculties with which the human soul 
is endowed — its amazing celerity, its wonderful power of 
recollecting past events, its sagacity in discerning the 
future, together with its numberless discoveries in the arts 
and sciences — I feel a conscious conviction that this active, 
comprehensive principle cannot possibly be of a mortal 
nature. 

And as this increasing activity of the soul derives its 
energy from its own intrinsic and essential powers, without 
receiving it from any foreign or external impulse, it neces- 
sarily follows that its activity must continue for ever. I 
am induced to embrace this opinion, not only as agree- 
able to the best deductions of reason, but also in deference 
to the authority of the noblest and most distinguished 
philosophers. 

I consider this world as a place which Nature never in- 
tended for my permanent abode; and I look on my de- 
parture from it, not as being driven from my habitation, 
but simply as leaving an inn. 

Cicero 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 107 

164 

This life is only a prelude to eternity, where we are 
to expect a new life, and another state of things. We 
have no prospect of heaven here, but at a distance. Let us 
therefore expect our last hour with courage — the last, I 
say, to our bodies but not to our minds. The day which we 
fear as our last, is but the birthday of our eternity. What 
we fear as a rock proves to be a harbour, in many cases 
to be desired, never to be refused. . . . That which we call 
death is but a pause or suspension; in truth, a progress into 
life. Only our thoughts look downward upon the body, 
and not forward upon things to come. ... A great soul 
takes no delight in staying with the body; it considers 
whence it came, and knows whither it is to go. We shall 
live in our bodies as if we were only to lodge in them this 
night, and to leave them tomorrow. ... It is the care of a 
wise and a good man to look to his manners and actions, 
and rather how well he lives than how long. For to die 
sooner or later is not the business, but to die well or ill; 
for death brings us to immortality. 

Seneca 

165 

Not by lamentations and mournful chants ought we to 
celebrate the funeral of a good man, but by hymns; for, 
in ceasing to be numbered with mortals, he enters upon the 
heritage of a diviner life. 

Plutarch 

166 

The messenger you sent to tell me of the death of our 
daughter missed his way. But I heard of it through an- 
other. 



108 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

I pray you let all things be done without ceremony or 
timorous superstition. And let us bear our affliction with 
patience. I do know very well what a loss we have had; 
but, if you should grieve overmuch, it would trouble me still 
more. She was particularly dear to you; and when you 
call to mind how bright and innocent she was, how amiable 
and mild, then your grief must be peculiarly bitter. . . . 

But should the sweet remembrance of those things which 
so delighted us when she was alive, only afflict now when 
she is dead? Or is there danger that, if we cease to mourn, 
we shall forget her? . . . Since she is gone where she 
feels no pain, let us not indulge in too much grief. The 
soul is incapable of death. And she, like a bird not long 
enough in her cage to become attached to it, is free to fly 
away to a purer air. . . . Since we cherish a trust like 
this, let our outward actions be in accord with it, and let 
us keep our hearts pure and our minds calm. 

Plutarch 



167 

Mother, leave thy grief, remembering the soul which 
Zeus has rendered immortal and undecaying to me for all 
time, and has carried now into the starry sky. 



Epitaph 



168 



Dying, thou art not dead! Thou art gone to a happier 

country, 
And in the isles of the blest thou rejoicest . . . and thou 

shalt find not 
Hunger or thirst any more, but, unholpen of man and un- 

heedful, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 109 

Spotless and fearless of sin, thou exultest in view of 

Olympus; 
Yea, and thy gods are thy light, and their glory is ever upon 

thee. 

Greek Anthology 

169 

Men said within themselves, reasoning not aright. 
Short and sorrowful is our life and there is no healing 
when a man cometh to his end. ... By mere chance were 
we bom, and hereafter we shall be as though we had never 
been: . . . the breath in our nostrils is smoke, and while 
our heart beateth reason is a spark which being extinguished 
the body shall be turned into ashes and the spirit shall be 
dispersed as thin air; ... our life shall pass away as the 
traces of a cloud and shall be scattered as is a mist when 
it is chased by the beams of the sun and overcome by the 
heat thereof. 

Thus reasoned they and they were led astray. . . . For 
God created man to be immortal, and made him in the 
image of his own eternity. . . . The souls of the righteous 
are in the hands of God, and there can no evil touch them. 
In the sight of the unwise they seem to die and their going 
from us is thought to be destruction; but they are in peace, 
for their hope is full of immortality. 

The Wisdom of Solomon 

170 

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, be- 
lieve also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions : 
if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare 
a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, 



110 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that where I 
am, there ye may be also. 

Jesus 

171 

Some man will say, How are the dead raised up, and 
with what body do they come? 

Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, ex- 
cept it die: and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not 
that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of 
wheat, or of some other grain: but God giveth it a body as 
it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body. 

All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of 
flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and 
another of birds. There are also celestial bodies, and 
bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and 
the glory of the terrestial is another. There is one glory 
of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another 
glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star 
in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead. 

It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption : 
. . . it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is 
sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. 

There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. 
. . . Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that 
which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. 
. . . As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: 
and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. 
And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also 
bear the image of the heavenly. 

Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot 
inherit the kingdom of God ; neither doth corruption inherit 
incorruption. . . . For this corruptible must put on incor- 
ruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 111 

So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, 
and this mortal shall have put on inunortality, then shall be 
brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swal- 
lowed up in victory. 

death, where is thy sting? grave, where is thy 
victory? 

Paul 

172 

. . . Those men who have forsaken human instruction, 
and having become well-disposed disciples of God, and 
having arrived at a comprehension of knowledge acquired 
without labour, have passed over to the immortal a most 
perfect race of beings, and have so received an inheritance 
better than the former generations of created men. . . . 
There is also another proof that the mind is immortal, 
which is of this nature : — There are some persons whom 
God, advancing to higher degrees of improvement, has 
enabled to soar above all species and genera, having placed 
them near himself; as he says to Moses, "But stand thou 
here with me." . . . Nor do I ever believe that the soul 
itself while awaiting this event was conscious of its own 
improvement, inasmuch as it was at that time becoming 
gradually divine, for God, in the case of those persons 
whom he is about to benefit, does not take him who is to 
receive the advantage into his counsels, but is accustomed 
rather to pour his benefits ungrudgingly upon him with- 
out his having any previous anticipation of them. 

Philo 

173 

As some poor exile on a distant shore. 
With sorrowful eye surveys the country o'er. 
And oft looks back, and oft recalls to mind 



112 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

The pleasing coast and friends he left behind, 

Unwilling views the cheerful light of day, 

And in ideal prospects pines away; 

So grieves my soul while absent and distrest. 

She roams an exile from her place of rest. 

Oh! haste the period, when from body free, 

This wretched captive shall return to thee; 

Shall once more recognize her kindred soil, 

And prove the blessing of her former toil; 

Plac'd where no change impairs, no griefs corrode, . 

And shining 'midst the immortal gods a god. 

Plotinus 

174 

If our flesh shrinks from prison, if it abhors everything 
which denies it the power of roaming about ; when it seems, 
indeed, to be always going forth, with its little powers of 
hearing or seeing what is beyond itself, how much more 
does our soul desire to escape from that prison house of the 
body, which, being free with movement like the air, goes 
whither we know not, and comes whence we know not. 
We know, however, that it survives the body, and that 
being set free from the bars of the body, it sees with clear 
gaze those things which before, dwelling in the body, it 
could not see. . . . So, then, if death frees us from the 
miseries of this world, it is certainly no evil, inasmuch 
as it restores liberty and excludes suffering. 

St. Ambrose 

175 

For why should I weep for thee, my most loving brother? 
. . . For I have not lost but changed my intercourse 
with thee; before we were inseparable in the body, — now 
we are undivided in affection; for thou remainest with 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 113 

me and ever wilt remain. . . . The ox seeks his fellow and 
conceives itself incomplete, and by frequent lowing shows 
its tender longing, if perchance that one is wanting with 
whom it has been wont to draw the plough. ... In work 
I was inferior, but in love more closely bound; not so 
much fit through my strength as endurable through thy 
patience. 

. . . The strong spirit of our brotherhood had so in- 
fused itself into each of us, that there was no need to 
prove our love by caresses; but our minds being conscious 
of our affection, we, satisfied with our inward love, did 
not seem to require the show of caresses, whom the very ap- 
pearance of each other fashioned for mutual love; for we 
seemed I know not by what spiritual stamp or bodily like- 
ness, to be the one in the other. . . . 

As a certain evening was drawing on, I was complain- 
ing that thou didst not revisit me when at rest, thou [who] 
wast wholly present always. So that, as I lay with my 
limbs bathed in sleep, thou wast alive to me; I could say: 
"What is death, my brother? "... So then, I hold thee, 
my brother, and neither death nor time shall tear thee from 
me. . . . For we have not ever been long separated from 
each other, but thou wast always sure to return. Since thou 
oanst not return again, I will go to thee; it is just that 
I should repay the kindness and take my turn. 

To thee. Almighty God, I commend this guileless soul. 
I offer beforehand these first libations of myself. I come 
to Thee with this pledge of life. Cause me not to re- 
main too long a debtor to such an amount. I can bear it, 
if I shall be soon compelled to pay it. 

Go before us to that home common and waiting for all, 
and certainly now longed for by me beyond others. Pre- 
pare a common dwelling for him with whom thou hast 
dwelt, and as here we have had all things in common, so 



114 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

there, too, let us know no divided rights. Do not, I pray 
thee, long put off him who is desirous of thee, expect him 
who is hastening to thee, help him who is hurrying, and 
if I seem to thee to delay too long, summon me. 

St. Ambrose 

176 

Where is he, the impeller of my work, whose voice was 
sweeter than the swan's last song? . . . Though I am loth 
to give way and comfort my feelings, tears flow down 
my cheeks and in spite of the teachings of virtue and the 
hope of the resurrection, a passion of regret crushes my 
too yielding mind. . . . The immortality of the soul and 
its continuation after the dissolution of the body — truths 
of which Pythagoras dreamed . . . and which Socrates dis- 
cussed in prison to console himself . . . are now the 
familiar themes of Indian and of Persian, of Goth and of 
Egyptian. 

. . . What can we do, my soul? Whither must we turn? 
. . . Are you so preoccupied with grief, so hindered by 
sobs, that you forget all logical sequence? ... I have read 
the consolatory writings of Plato, Diogenes, Clitomachus, 
Carneades, Posidonius, who at diff'erent times strove by 
book or letter to lessen the grief of various persons. Con- 
sequently, were my own wit to dry up, it could be watered 
anew from the fountains which these have opened. . . . 
We know indeed that Nepotian is with Christ and that he has 
joined the choirs of the saints. What here with us he 
groped after on earth afar ofif and sought for to the best 
of his judgment, there he sees nigh at hand so that he can 
say: " as we have heard so have we seen in the city of the 
Lord of hosts, in the city of our God." Set a limit, I pray 
you, to your sorrow and remember the saying " in nothing 
overmuch." Bind up for a little while your wound and 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 115 

listen to the praises of one in whose virtues you have always 
delighted. . . . Where now are that handsome face and 
dignified figure with which as with a fair garment his 
beautiful soul was clothed? The lily began to wither, alas! 
when the south wind blew, and the purple violet slowly 
faded into paleness. Yet while he burned with fever and 
while the fire of sickness was drying up the fountains of 
his veins, gasping and weary he still tried to comfort his 
sorrowing uncle. His countenance shone with gladness, 
and while all around him wept, he and he only smiled. 
He flung aside his cloak, put out his hand, saw what others 
failed to see, and even tried to rise that he might welcome 
new comers. You would have thought that he was start- 
ing on a journey instead of dying and that in place of 
leaving all his friends behind him he was merely passing 
from some to others. 

St. Jerome 

177 

He had understanding of righteousness, and discerned 
great and marvellous wonders; and he prevailed with the 
Most High, and is numbered among the saintly company. 

Church Service 

178 

Where miracles are there tears ought not to be. . . . 
In the case of our dead, likewise, a great mystery is cele- 
brating. . . . Wouldst thou learn that thou mayst know, 
that this is no time for tears? ... As if leaving her dwell- 
ing, the soul goes forth, speeding her way to her own 
Lord, and dost thou mourn? Why then thou shouldst do 
this on the birth of a child; for this in fact is also a birth, 
and a better than that. For here she goes forth to a very 
difi'erent light, is loosed as from a prison-house, comes off 



116 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

as from a contest. . . . For as the Sun arises clear and 
bright, so the soul, leaving the body with a pure conscience, 
shines joyously. Not such the spectacle of Emperor as he 
comes in state to take possession of the city, not such the 
hush of awe, as when the soul, having quitted the body, 
is departing in company with Angels. Think what the soul 
must then be! in what amazement, what wonder, what de- 
light! 

St. John Chrysostom 

179 

There is coming a reaping, Death, that will leave thee 
bare: and the Watchers shall go forth as reapers, and make 
thee desolate. . . . Does not the seed teach thee, which de- 
cays and dies: and is cut off from hope, yet from the rain, 
recovers hope? . . . The babe in the womb confutes thee, 
which is as buried there; to me it proclaims life from the 
dead, but to thee despoiling. The despised flower despises 
thee, for it is shut up and passed over: yet though lost, 
it is not lost, but blossoms again. The chick cries out 
from the egg, wherein it is buried: and the graves are rent 
by a Voice and the body arises. 

Ephraem Syrus 

180 

Is it a misfortune to pass from infancy to youth? Still 
less can it be a misfortune to go from this miserable life 
to that truer life into which we are introduced by death. 
Our first changes are connected with the progressive de- 
velopment of life. The new change which death effects is 
only the passage to a more desirable perfection. 

Gregory of Nyssa 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 117 

181 

... As the eye, by virtue of the bright ray which is in 
fellowship with the light, and by its innate capacity draws 
to itself that which is akin to it, . . . so was it needful 
that a certain afiinity with the Divine should be mingled 
with the nature of man, in order that by means of this cor- 
respondence it might aim at that which was native to it. 
. . . Thus, then, it was needful for man, born for the en- 
joyment of Divine good, to have something in his nature 
akin to that in which he is to participate. . . . Since, then, 
one of the excellences connected with the Divine nature 
is also eternal existence, it was altogether needful that the 
equipment of our nature should not be without the further 
gift of this attribute, but should have in itself the immortal, 
that by its inherent faculty it might both recognize what is 
above it, and be possessed with a desire for the divine and 
eternal life. 

Gregory of Nyssa 

182 

A state of happiness ought to be perfect, so that there 
can be nothing which can harass, or lessen, or change it. 
Nor can anything be judged happy in other respect, unless 
it be incorruptible. But nothing is incorruptible but that 
which is immortal. Immortality therefore is alone happy, 
because it can neither be corrupted nor destroyed. But 
if virtue falls within the power of man, which no one can 
deny, happiness also belongs to him. For it is impossible 
for a man to be wretched who is endued with virtue. If 
happiness falls within his power, then immortality, which 
is possessed of the attribute of happiness, also belongs 
to him. 

The chief good, therefore, is found to be immortality 



118 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

alone, which pertains to no other animal or body; nor can 
it happen to any one without the virtue of knowledge, that 
is, without the knowledge of God and justice. 

Lactantius 

183 

That the soul is made immortal is a further point. . . . 
This can be made clear once for all from the action of 
the soul in the body. For if even when united and coupled 
with the body, it is not shut in or commensurate with the 
small dimensions of the body . . . much more shall its life 
continue after the death of the body. . . . For this is the 
reason why the soul thinks of and bears in mind things 
immortal and eternal, namely, because it is itself immortal. 
Just as, the body being mortal, its senses also have mortal 
things as their objects, so, since the soul contemplates 
and beholds immortal things, it follows that it is immortal 
and lives for ever. For ideas and thoughts about im- 
mortality never desert the soul, but abide in it, and are as 
it were the fuel in it which ensures its immortality. . . . 

Athanasius 

184 

It is plain that the human soul is of such a character that, 
if it diligently observes that end for which it exists, it at 
some time lives in blessedness, truly secure from death 
itself and from every other trouble. 

Hence the soul that has once begun to enjoy supreme 
Blessedness will be eternally blessed. 

But undoubtedly all human souls are of the same nature. 
Hence, since it is established that some are immortal, every 
human soul must be immortal. 

Su Anselm 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 119 

185 

In the heavenly kingdom the souls of the Saints are re- 
joicing, who followed the footsteps of Christ their Master, 
and since for love of Him they freely poured forth their 
life-blood, therefore with Christ they reign for ever and 
ever. 

Church Service 

186 

Holy is the true light, and passing wonderful, lending 
radiance to them that endured in the heat of the conflict: 
from Christ they inherit a home of unfading splendour, 
wherein they rejoice with gladness evermore. 

Church Service 

187 

... In that place they shall forget this world. There 
they have no want; and they shall love one another with 
an abundant love. In their bodies there shall be no 
heaviness, and lightly shall they fly as doves to their 
windows. . . . Fervent in their heart will be the love of 
each other; and hatred will not be fixed within them at 
all. . . . The air of that region is pleasant and glorious, 
and its light shines out, and is goodly and gladsome. . . . 
Spacious is the region, nor is it limited, yet its inhabitants 
shall see its distance even as that which is near. In that 
place there is no deficiency, but fulness and perfection. 

Aphraates 

188 

. . . The supreme good of the city of God is perfect and 
eternal peace, . . . the peace of freedom from all evil, in 



120 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

which immortals ever abide, who can deny that this future 
life is most blessed? . . . But the actual possession of the 
happiness of this life, without the hope of what is beyond, 
is but a false happiness and profound misery. For the 
true blessings of the soul are not now enjoyed; for that 
is no true wisdom which does not direct all its prudent 
observations and just arrangements, to that end in which 
God shall be all in all in a secure eternity and perfect 
peace. There we shall enjoy the gifts of nature . . . gifts 
not only good but eternal. There the virtues shall no 
longer be struggling against any vice or evil, and shall en- 
joy the reward of victory, the eternal peace which no 
adversary shall disturb. This is the final blessedness, this 
the ultimate consummation, the unending end. Here, in- 
deed, we are said to be blessed when we have such peace 
as can be enjoyed in a good life; but such blessedness 
is mere misery compared to that final felicity. 

St. Augustine 

189 

The true Jerusalem above, the holy town is there, 

Whose duties are so full of joy, whose joy so free from 

care; 
"Where disappointment cometh not to check the longing 

heart. 
And where the heart, in ecstasy, hath gained her better part. 

glorious King, happy state, palace of the blest! 
sacred place and holy joy, and perfect heavenly rest, 
To thee aspire thy citizens in glory's bright array 
And what they feel and what they know they strive in vain 
to say. 

Abelard 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 121 

190 

There we shall taste how gracious the Lord is, see the 
beauties of his holiness, the lustre of his Saints, and the 
glories of his Palace and Throne. 

There the saints' love shall never grow cold, their hopes 
and expectations shall never languish by delays, for in God 
all good shall be present with them and they shall all 
partake in common of the same wisdom and power and 
righteousness and peace. 

No difference of language shall be there heard, but all 
things uniform and hearts harmonious; the same disposi- 
tions and the same affections. In the overflowing River 
of this Pleasure there will be gratification to the full, the 
perfection of bliss, and glory and gladness. 

The desires of beholding and possessing thee will be ever 
fresh and growing, and the delights of thee ever new and 
entertaining. In thee our understandings will be enlight- 
ened, in thee our affections ever purified, so as to know 
and love the truth ever more and more. 

Now we see bodies with the eyes of our body; we form 
ideas of bodies by the powers of the Soul ; but then we shall 
see God himself with a clear intuitive knowledge. 

St. Bernard 

191 

most blessed mansion of the city which is above! 
most clear day of eternity, which night obscureth not, but 
the highest truth ever enlighteneth ! day ever joyful, 
ever secure, and never changing into a contrary state! . . . 

To the saints it shineth, glowing with everlasting bright- 
ness, but to those that are pilgrims on the earth, it ap- 
peareth only afar off, and as it were through a glass. 

merciful Jesu, when shall I stand to behold thee? 



122 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

. . . When shall I be with thee in thy kingdom, which thou 
hast prepared for thy beloved from all eternity? 

Thomas a Kempis 

192 

The eternal manifestation of the divine light is called 
the kingdom of heaven and the habitation of holy angels 
and souls. . . . 

But the soul sinketh down in the hope of divine grace 
and standeth like a fair rose in the midst of thorns, until 
the kingdom of this world falleth off from it in the death 
of the body; and then doth it become first truly and really 
manifest in the love of God having nothing more to hinder 
or molest it. . . . 

And though indeed the bestial body must putrifie and 
rot, yet its power and virtue liveth and in the meanwhile 
there grow out of its power in its Mother, fair beautiful 
Roses, blossoms and flowers ; though it were quite burned up 
and consimied in the Fire, yet its power and virtue standeth 
in the four elements in the word and the soul qualifieth, 
mixeth and uniteth therewith ; for the Soul is in Heaven and 
the same heaven is everywhere even in the midst or centre 
of the Earth. 

Jakob Boehme 

193 

The nature of the soul is so simple that space cannot 
hinder it. . . . 

Its [the soul's] ardent longing for God compels it to 
follow after Him, as fire follows its own nature until it 
has consumed and transformed into itself the object upon 
which it seized. . . . 

The eternity of God knows neither first nor last, it is 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 123 

an everlasting present in which the life and the works of 
God take place, for God Himself is this now. . . . 

The fruit of those [good] works remains in the spirit; 
and although the work and the time are not eternal, never- 
theless the spirit from which they proceeded, lives, and 
the fruit of the work, but without the work and the time, 
is full of grace. 

Meister Eckhart 

194 

my God! how happy is the soul of which thou art the 
delight, since it can abandon itself to loving thee, not only 
without scruple, but also with merit! How firm and 
durable is its happiness, since its expectation will never be 
frustrated, because thou wilt never be destroyed, and neither 
life nor death will ever separate it from the object of its 
desires, . . . the [just] will subsist eternally in the eternal 
and self-subsistent object to which they are closely bound! 
Oh! how happy are those who with an entire liberty, and 
irresistible inclination of their will, love perfectly and 
freely that which they are obliged to love necessarily! 

Pascal 

195 

. . . Let us no longer regard a man as having ceased to 
live, although nature suggests it; but as beginning to live, 
as truth assures. Let us no longer regard his soul as 
perished and reduced to nothingness, but as quickened and 
united to the sovereign life; and let us thus correct, by at- 
tention to these truths, the sentiments of error so deeply 
implanted in ourselves and those emotions of horror so 
natural to mankind. 

Pascal 



124 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

196 

It has been urged, that the soul having been created 
only to be united to the body, it is so limited to this 
society, that its borrowed existence must cease when the 
association with the body terminates. But it is speaking 
wildly, and without proof, thus to assume that the soul 
has been created with an existence confined solely to the 
time of its society with the body. . . . We perceive that 
the existence of the body is not confined to the duration of 
its society with the soul. After death has severed this con- 
nection, the body still exists, even to its most minute par- 
ticles. We see two things only — the one, that the body is 
separated and disintegrated; this cannot happen to the 
soul, which is simple, indivisible, and void of arrange- 
ment; the other, that the body moves no longer with de- 
pendence on the thoughts of the soul. Should we not con- 
clude, then, in the same manner, and with much greater 
reason, that the soul continues to exist on its side, and that 
it then commences to think, independently of the operations 
of the body. 

Fenelon 

197 

When one dies one feels the separation of the soul from 
his body. When the soul thus separates itself, there is no 
longer any sensation; he is without life, and death makes 
a separation from all. But, when the man is raised up, 
he feels himself revivified. When he is reanimated, he ex 
periences in his new state that God is the soul of his soul 
the life of his life, in such way that he makes himself the 
as it were, natural principle of it, without the soul's feel 
ing or perceiving it by reason of its unity or intimateness 

Madame Guy on 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 125 

198 

I have had a presentiment that you would not survive 
this illness. I lose in you my most faithful, and the only 
friend on whom I could rely, in the persecutions which 
threaten me. I feel my loss but rejoice in your happiness. 
I could envy you. Death only lends a helping hand to rend 
away the veil, which hides infinite beauties. Our Lord has 
strongly cemented our souls. May the benediction of the 
divine Master rest upon you. Go, blessed soul, and re- 
ceive the recompense prepared for all those, who are wholly 
the Lord's. Go, we separate in the name of the Lord; 
I cannot say a last adieu, for we shall be for ever united 
in Him. I hope in the goodness of God to be present 
with you in heart and spirit, at the time of your departure, 
and to receive with you, the divine Master who is waiting 
for you. Be my ambassador in the courts above, and say 
to Him I love Him. 

Madame Guyon 

199 

. . . And when, Virgin, I shall come to die, 

Remember that the poet is but a child, 

And hush me with the little drowsy song 

That soothed Him when His eyes with dreams were wild 

And the vague mystery of the night was by. 

He was a frightened child . . . nay, your eyes throng 

With memories . . . and let it not be long, 

The drowsiness; but croon. 

And bring deep slumber soon. 

And now it seems to me — oh, is it wrong — 

I feel your tears fall on my tired head. . . . 

And when I fall, seeing I wear your sleeve, 

Succour me, Holy One, 



126 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Sun that outshines the sun! 

Permit not that I faint alone and grieve. 

Commend me to your Son that, when I cease 

To breathe this air, He may, 

True God and Man, plunge deep my soul in peace. 

Petrarch 

200 

Let be, calling bird and rippling lake; 

And, crystal cymbals of the running streams, 

Cease your intolerable clash that seems 

Her cries and laughter: for my soul's awake. 

And all my helpless verse into the heart-break 

Of song springs up. Nay, what is that? There gleams 

A Silken Something where the wild rose teems, 

I thought her in the clay, by some mistake. 

Not understanding heaven; but rosy, tanned, 

She's there — that movement — all the red and white: 

" No tears ! No tears ! You do not understand 

That, when I seemed to have closed my eyes that night, 

I merely opened them upon a land 

Like one great flower — Infinity — the Light." 

PetTarch 

201 

Closer and closer come the golden calls — 

My Lady's honied, nerve-convincing note: 

How well I know its cadences by rote. 

As they come lingering from the jasper walls; 

And all my stoicism, how it falls! 

When I look in a mirror — strange, remote, 

A face looks up, on whose wan tints I gloat 

And say: " How soon now you will deck Death's halls! " 

If I could only know the when, the where. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 127 

Of loosing this poor gown, so slight, so frail, 
And yet so heavy with mortality. 
The when, the where, of leaving my dim jail 
The world, and meeting, high up in the air, 
My Lord and Lady, who do wait me there! 



Petrarch 



202 



splendour of God ! by means of which I saw 
The lofty triumph of the realm veracious, 
Give me the power to say how it I saw! 

There is a light above, which visible 
Makes the Creator unto every creature, 
Who only in beholding Him has peace, 

And it expands itself in circular form 
To such extent, that its circumference 
Would be too large a girdle for the sun. 

The semblance of it is all made of rays 
Reflected from the top of Primal Motion, 
Which takes therefrom vitality and power 

And as a hill in water at its base 

Mirrors itself, as if to see its beauty 
When aflBuent most in verdure and in flowers, 

So, ranged aloft all round about the light, 

Mirrored I saw in more ranks than a thousand 
All who above there have from us returned. 

And if the lowest row collect within it 
So great a light, how vast the amplitude 
Is of this Rose in its extremest leaves! 

My vision in the vastness and the height 
Lost not itself, but comprehended all 
The quantity and quality of that gladness. . . . 

In fashion then as if a snow-white rose 

Displayed itself to me the saintly host, . . . 



128 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Their faces had they all of living flame, 

And wings of gold, and all the rest so white 
No snow unto that limit doth attain. . . . 

This realm secure and full of gladsomeness, 
Crowded with ancient people and with modern, 
Unto one mark had all its look and love. 

Dante 

203 

Whene'er the idol of these eyes appears 
Unto my musing heart so weak and strong. 
Death comes between her and my soul ere long 
Chasing her thence with troops of gathering fears. 

Nathless this violence my spirit cheers 

With better hope than if she had no wrong; 

While Love invincible arrays the throng 

Of dauntless thoughts, and thus harangues his peers: 

But once, he argues, can a mortal die; 

But once be born: and he who dies afire. 
What shall he gain if erst he dwell with me? 

That burning love whereby the soul flies free, 
Doth lure each fervent spirit to aspire 
Like gold refined in flame to God on high. 

Michael Angela 

204 

So friendly is the fire to flinty stone. 

That, struck therefrom and kindled to a blaze, 
It burns the stone, and from the ash doth raise 
What lives thenceforward binding stones in one: 

Kiln-hardened this resists both frost and sun. 
Acquiring higher worth for endless days — 
As the purged soul from hell returns with praise. 
Amid the heavenly host to take her throne. 






THE GRAIL OF LIFE 129 

E'en so the fire struck from my soul, that lay 
Close-hidden in my heart, may temper me, 
Till burned and slaked to better life I rise. 

If, made mere smoke and dust, I live today, 
Fire-hardened I shall live eternally; 
Such gold, not iron, my spirit strikes and tries. 

Michael Angela 

205 

Now you see that the hope and the desire of return- 
ing home and to one's former state is like the moth to the 
light, and that the man who with constant longing waits 
with joy each new spring time, each new summer, each 
new month and new year — deeming that the things he 
longs for are ever too late in coming — does not perceive 
that he is longing for his own destruction. But this desire 
is the very quintessence, the spirit of the elements, which 
finding itself imprisoned with the soul is ever longing 
to return from the human body to its giver. And you must 
know that this same longing is that quintessence, insep- 
arable from nature, and that man is the image of the world. 

Leonardo da Vinci 

206 

The soul can never be corrupted with the corruption 
of the body, but is in the body as it were the air which 
causes the sound of the organ, where, when a pipe bursts, 
the wind would cease to have any good effect. 

Leonardo da Vinci 

207 

What is our true resurrection and renewment? Even 
that God should reserve us and set us in his kingdom; that 
when he has made us to wayfare through this world, and 



130 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

to pass through fire and water and all other afflictions, 
we may in the end be exempted from all the miseries of this 
world, and be made partakers of his life and glory. . . . 

We truly hear that the Kingdom of God shall be stuffed 
full with brightness, joy, felicity and glory. . . . 

Seeing that we have such promises at God's hand, and 
such assurance in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, we 
ought to fight manfully against the dreadfulness of death. 

Christ, therefore, is risen again, that he might have us 
companions of the life to come. He was raised up of the 
Father — he was raised up by the power of the Spirit, 
which is common to us, unto the office of quickening. 

John Calvin 

208 

... Plain it is that every one that dieth, departeth either 
in the faith of Christ Jesus, or departeth in incredulity; 
plain it is, that they that depart in the true faith of Christ 
Jesus rest from their labours, and from death do go to life 
everlasting. 

The departed are in peace, and rest from their labours; 
not that they sleep, and come to a certain oblivion (as 
some fantastic heads do affirm) , but that they are delivered 
from all fear, all torment, and all temptation, to which 
we and all God's elect are subject in this life. 

John Knox 

209 

Woods, hills, and rivers, now are desolate 
Sith he is gone, the which then all did grace; 
And all the fields do wail their widow state, 
Sith death their fairest flower did late deface; 
The fairest flower in field that ever grew 
Was Astrophel; that was we all may rue . . , 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 131 

Break now your girlonds, ye shepherds' lasses! 
Sith the fair flower which them adorned is gone; 
The flower which them adorned is gone to ashes, 
Never again let lass put girlond on: 
Instead of girlond wear sad cypress now, 
And bitter elder broken from the bough. 

We ever sing the love-lays which he made; 
Who ever made such lays of love as he? 
We ever read the riddles which he said 
Unto yourselves to make you merry glee: 
Your merry glee is now laid all abed. 
Your merry maker now, alas! is dead. 

Death, the devourer of all world's delight. 
Hath robbed you and reft from me my joy; 
Both you and me, and all the world, he quite 
Hath robbed of joyance, and left sad annoy. 
Joy of the world, and shepherd's pride, was he; 
Shepherds, hope never like again to see. 

O Death ! that hast us of such riches reft. 
Tell us, at least, what hath thou with it done? 
What is become of him whose flower here left 
Is but the shadow of his likeness gone? 
Scarce like the shadow of that which he was. 
Nought like, but that he like a shade did pass. 

But that immortal spirit, which was decked 

With all the dowries of celestial grace. 

By sovereign choice from th* heavenly quires select, 

And lineally derived from angels' race, 

what is now of it become? aread: 

Aye me! can so divine a thing be dead. 



132 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Ah! no: it is not dead, ne can it die. 
But lives for aye in blissful paradise. 
Where like a new-born babe it soft doth lie 
In bed of lilies, wrapt in tender wise. 
And compassed all about with roses sweet. 
And dainty violets from head to feet. 

There thousand birds, all of celestial brood, 
To him do sweetly carol day and night, 
And with strange notes, of him well understood. 
Lull him asleep in angel-like delight; 
Whilst in sweet dream to him presented be 
Immortal beauties, which no eye may see. 

But he them sees, and takes exceeding pleasure 
Of their divine aspects, appearing plain. 
And kindling love in him above all measure; 
Sweet love, still joyous, never feeling pain; 
For what so goodly form he there doth see 
He may enjoy, from jealous rancour free. 

There liveth he in everlasting bliss. 
Sweet spirit! never fearing more to die, 
Ne dreading harm from any foes of his, 
Ne fearing savage beasts' more cruelty. 
Whilst we here wretches wail his private lack. 
And with vain vows do often call him back. 

But live thou there still, happy, happy Spirit! 
And give us leave thee here to lament; 
Not thee that dost thy heaven's joys inherit. 
But our own selves, that here in dole are drent. 
Thus do we weep and wail, and wear our eyes, 
Mourning in others our own miseries. 

Edmund Spenser 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 133 

210 
.... I believe that the souls of those that die in the Lord 
are blessed, and rest from their labours, and enjoy the sight 
of God. . . . 

Francis Bacon 

211 

. . . Christ said to Martha, "I am the resurrection and 
the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead 
(mark, though he were dead) yet shall he live (mark, 
live though he be dead) ; and whosoever liveth, and 
believeth in me, shall never die." . . . This is the true and 
substantial belief. . . . The true servants of God have 
their fruits unto holiness, and their end is everlasting life. 

George Fox 

212 

After this it was noised abroad that Mr. Valiant-for-Truth 
was sent for by a summons. ... When he understood it, 
he called for his friends, and told them of it. Then, said 
he, " I am going to my Father's; and though with great 
diflSculty I have got hither, yet now I do not repent me 
of all the trouble I have been at to arrive where I am. 
My sword I give to him that shall succeed me in my 
pilgrimage, and my courage and skill to him that can get 
it. My marks and scars I carry with me, to be a witness 
for me that I have fought His battles who will now be 
my reward." When the day that he must go hence 
was come, many accompanied him to the river-side, into 
which as he went, he said, " Death, where is thy sting? " 
And as he went down deeper, he said, " Grave, where is 
thy victory? " So he passed over, and all the trumpets 
sounded for him on the other side. 

John Bunyan 



134 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

213 

. . . Weep no more, 
For Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead. 
Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor. 
So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed. 
And yet anon repairs his drooping head. 
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore 
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky: 
So Lycidas, sunk low, but mounted high . . . 
Where other groves and other streams along . . . 
[He] hears the unexpressive nuptial song. 
In the blest kingdoms meek of joy and love. 
There entertain him all the Saints above, 
In solemn troops, and sweet societies. 
That sing, and singing in their glory move, 
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes. 

John Milton 

214 

. . . death like sleep, 
A gentle wafting to immortal life. 

John Milton 

215 

One short sleep past we wake eternally, 

And Death shall be no more; Death thou shalt die. 

John Donne 

216 

. . . Many things prove it palpably absurd to conclude 
that we shall cease to be at death. . . . There is nothing 
to be thought strange in our being able to exist in another 
state of life. And that we are now living beings affords a 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 135 

strong probability that we shall continue so; unless there is 
some positive ground, and there is 'none from reason or 
analogy, to think death will destroy us. . . . Indeed [a per- 
suasion of this kind] can have no other ground than some 
such imagination as that of our gross bodies being ourselves, 
which is contrary to experience. Experience too most 
clearly shows us the folly of concluding from the body 
and the living agent affecting each other mutually, that 
the dissolution of the former is the destruction of the latter. 
There are remarkable instances of their not affecting each 
other, which lead us to a contrary conclusion. The sup- 
position, then, which in all reason we are to go upon, is 
that our living nature will continue after death. . . ." 

Bishop Butler 

217 

. . . It [is] uncertain what the state -of separation [is]; 
. . . but it is ten to one that when we die, we shall j&nd the 
state of affairs wholly differing from all our opinions here, 
and that no man or sect hath guessed anything at all of it 
as it is. . . . However it be, it is certain they [the de- 
parted] are not dead; and though we no more see the 
souls of our dead friends than we did when they were alive, 
yet we have reason to believe them to know more things 
and better. . . . 

Jeremy Taylor 

218 

. . . There is something in us that can be without us, 
and will be after us. ... I believe that the whole frame 
of a beast doth perish, and is left in the same state after 
death as before it materialled into life: that the souls of 
men know neither contrary nor corruption; that they 
subsist beyond the body, and outlive death by the privilege 



136 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

of their proper natures, and without a miracle; that the 
souls of the faithful, as they leave earth, take possession 
of heaven. . . 

Sir Thomas Browne 

219 

. . . That souls remain after they are separated from 
their bodies ... is a most ancient tradition. . . . Neither 
can we find any argument drawn from nature which over- 
throws this . . . tradition. . . . Nay, there are many not 
inconsiderable arguments for the contrary; such as the 
absolute power every man has over his own actions; a 
natural desire of immortality; the power of conscience, 
which comforts him when he has performed any good 
actions, though never so difl&cult; and, on the contrary, tor- 
ments him when he has done any bad thing, especially 
at the approach of death. ... If then the soul be of such 
a nature, [it] contains no principles of corruption; and 
God has given us many tokens by which we ought to under- 
stand that his will is, it should remain after its body. . . . 

Hugo Grotius 

220 

How can it enter into the thoughts of man, that the 
soul, which is capable of such immense perfections, and 
of receiving new improvements to all eternity, shall fall 
away into nothing almost as soon as it is created? Are 
such abilities made to no purpose? . . . Were a human 
soul thus at a stand in her accomplishments, were her 
faculties to be full blown, and incapable of further en- 
largements, I could imagine it might fall away insensibly, 
and drop at once into a state of annihilation. But can we 
believe a thinking being that is in a perpetual progress 
of improvements, and travelling on from perfection to per- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 137 

fection, after having just looked abroad into the works 
of its Creator, and made a few discoveries of his infinite 
goodness, wisdom and power, must perish at her first set- 
ting out, and in the very beginning of her inquiries? 

. . . There is not, in my opinion, a more pleasing and 
triumphant consideration in religion, than this of the 
perpetual progress which the soul makes towards the per- 
fection of its nature, without ever arriving at a period 
in it. To look upon the soul as going on from strength to 
strength, to consider that she is to shine for ever with new 
accessions of glory, and brighten to all eternity; that she 
will be still adding virtue to virtue, and knowledge to 
knowledge; carries in it something wonderfully agreeable 
to that ambition which is natural to the mind of man. 
Nay, it must be a prospect pleasing to God himself, to see 
his creation for ever beautifying in his eyes, and drawing 
nearer to him, by greater degrees of resemblance. 

. . . With what astonishment and veneration may we 
look into our own souls, where there are such hidden 
stores of virtue and knowledge, such inexhausted sources 
of perfection? . . . The soul, considered with its Creator, 
is like one of those mathematical lines that may draw 
nearer to another to all eternity without a possibility of 
touching it: and can there be a thought so transporting, 
as to consider ourselves in these perpetual approaches to 
him, who is not only the standard of perfection but of 
happiness! 

Joseph Addison 

221 

He [God] is not eternity or infinity, but eternal and 
infinite; he is not duration or space, but he endures and 
is present. He endures for ever and is everywhere present ; 
and by existing always and everywhere, he constitutes dura- 



138 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

tion and space. Every soul that has perception is, though 
in different times and in different organs of sense and 
motion, still the same indivisible person. There are given 
successive parts in duration, co-existent parts in space, but 
neither the one nor the other in the person of a man or his 
thinking principle; and much less can there be found in 
the thinking substance of God. 

Sir Isaac Newton 

222 

. . . Eternity is the very essence of God, in so far as 
this involves necessary existence. Imagination is the idea 
wherewith the mind contemplates a thing as present, yet 
this idea indicates rather the present disposition of the 
human body than the nature of the eternal thing. There- 
fore emotion is imagination in so far as it indicates the 
present disposition of the body; therefore the mind is, only 
while the body endures, subject to emotions which are 
attributable to passions. Hence it follows that no love 
save intellectual love is eternal. ... If we look to men's 
general opinion we shall see that they are indeed con- 
scious of the eternity of the mind, but that they confuse 
eternity with duration and ascribe it to the imagination or 
the memory which they believe to remain after death. 

God is absolutely infinite, that is, the nature of God re- 
joices in infinite perfection; and such rejoicing is ac- 
companied by the idea of himself, that is, the idea of his 
own cause: now this is what we have described as in- 
tellectual love. 

This love of the mind must be referred to the activities 
of the mind; it is itself, indeed, an activity whereby the 
mind regards itself accompanied by the idea of God as 
cause; that is, an activity whereby God, in so far as can 
be explained through the human mind, regards himself 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 139 

accompanied by the idea of himself; therefore, this love 
of the mind is part of the infinite love wherewith God 
loves himself. 

Hence it follows that God, in so far as he loves him- 
self, loves man, and consequently, that the love of God 
towards man, and the intellectual love of the mind towards 
God, are identical. From what has been said we clearly 
understand, wherein our salvation, or blessedness, or free- 
dom consists; namely, in the constant and eternal love 
towards God, and in God's love toward men. 

Spinoza 

223 

God, out of his infinite mercy, . . . bestows eternal life 
on mortal man. . . . This may serve to explain the . . . 
sons of God, who are . . . like their Father, made after 
his image and likeness. For this image, to which they 
[are] conformed, [is] immortality and eternal life. 

John Locke 

224 

It belongs only to the supreme Reason, whom nothing 
escapes, distinctly to comprehend all the infinite and to' see 
all the reasons and all the consequences. All that we can 
do in regard to infinites is to know them confusedly, and 
to know at least distinctly that they are such, otherwise 
we judge very wrongly of the beauty and grandeur of the 
universe; so also we could not have a sound Physics ex- 
plaining the nature of bodies in general, and still less 
a proper Pneumatology comprising the knowledge of God, 
of souls, and of simple substances in general. 

This knowledge of insensible perceptions serves also to 
explain why and how two souls, human or otherwise, of 
one and the same species never come forth perfectly alike 



140 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

from the hands of the Creator and have always each its 
original relation to the points of view which it will have 
in the universe. But this it is which already follows from 
the remarks I have made about two individuals, viz.: 
that their difference is always more than numerical. There 
is, moreover, another point of importance, in respect to 
which I am obliged to deviate not only from the opinions 
of our author [Locke] but also from those of the majority 
of modern philosophers: I believe with the majority of 
the ancients that all genii, all souls, all simple created sub- 
stances, are always joined to a body, and that there are 
never souls entirely separated. I have a priori reasons 
for my view, but the doctrine will be found to have this 
advantage, that it resolves all the philosophical difficulties 
as to the condition of souls, their perpetual conservation, 
their immortality and their operation. The difference be- 
tween one of their states and another, never being and 
never having been other than that of more sensible to less 
sensible, of more perfect to less perfect, or the reverse, this 
doctrine renders their past or future state as explicable 
as that of the present. One feels sufficiently, however little 
reflection he makes, that this is rational, and that a leap 
from one state to another infinitely different could not 
be natural. I am astonished that by leaving the natural 
without reason, the schoolmen have been willing purposely 
to plunge themselves into very great difficulties, and to 
supply matter for apparent triumphs of the strong-minded, 
all of whose reasons fall at once by this explanation of 
things, in which there is no more difficulty in conceiving 
the conservation of souls than there is in conceiving the 
change of the caterpillar into the butterfly, and the con- 
servation of thought in sleep, to which Jesus Christ has 
divinely well compared death. I have already said also 
that sleep could not last always and that it will last least 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 141 

or almost not at all in the case of rational souls who are 
always destined to preserve the personality which has been 
given them in the City of God, and consequently remem- 
brance; and this in order to be more susceptible of chastise- 
ments and recompenses. And I add further that in gen- 
eral no derangement of the visible organs is capable of 
throwing things into entire confusion in the animal or of 
destroying all the organs and depriving the soul of all its 
organic body and of the ineffaceable remains of all preced- 
ing traces. . . . The perplexity into which men have fallen 
by their ignorance . . . has caused us, in my opinion, 
to neglect the natural explanation of the conservation of 
the soul. This has done much harm to natural religion, 
and has caused many to believe that our immortality was 
only a miraculous grace of God. . . . 

If any one should say that God may add the faculty 
of thinking to the prepared mechanism, I should reply 
that if this were done, and if God adds this faculty to matter 
without putting therein at the same time a substance which 
was the subject of inhesion of this same faculty, i.e., 
without adding thereto an immaterial soul, it would be 
necessary that matter should be miraculously exalted in 
order to receive a power of which it is naturally incapable. 
... It is enough that it cannot be maintained that matter 
thinks without putting into it an imperishable soul or a 
miracle, and that thus the immortality of our souls follows 
from what is natural, since their extinction can be main- 
tained only by a miracle, whether by exalting matter or by 
annihilating the soul. 

Leibnitz 

225 

If the immortality of the soul were an error, I should 
be sorry not to believe it. I avow that I am not so 



142 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

humble as the atheist; I know not how they think, but 
for me, I do not wish to exchange the idea of immortality 
against that of the beatitude of one day. I delight in 
believing myself as immortal as God himself. Independ- 
ently of revealed ideas, metaphysical ideas give me a vigour- 
ous hope of my eternal wellbeing, which I would never 
renounce. 

Montesquieu 

226 

Man lives for ever, because he is capable of being con- 
joined with God by love and faith; every one is capable of 
this. 

Emanuel Swedenborg 

227 

When the body is no longer able to discharge its func- 
tions in the natural world, corresponding to the thoughts 
and affections of its spirit which it has from the spiritual 
world, then man is said to die. . . . Yet man does not die, 
but is only separated from the bodily part which he had 
for use in the world, and the man himself lives. It is said 
that the man himself lives, because man is not man from 
the body, but from the spirit, since the spirit thinks in 
man, and thought with affection makes man. From this it 
is plain that man when he dies, only passes from one 
world to another. Hence it is that death ... in its in- 
ternal sense, signifies resurrection and continuation of life. 

Emanuel Swedenborg 

228 

The metaphysical arguments for the immortality of the 
soul are . . . inconclusive; . . . the moral arguments or 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 143 

those derived from the analogy of nature are strong and 
convincing. 

David Hume 
229 

It must be so — Plato, thou reasonest well! 

Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 

This longing after immortality? 

Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror, 

Of falling into nought? Why shrinks the soul 

Back on herself, and startles at destruction? 

'Tis the divinity that stirs within us; 

'Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter. 

And intimates eternity to man. 

Joseph Addison 
230 

My words and thoughts do both expresse this notion, 
That Life hath with the sun a double motion. 
The first is straight, and our diurnal friend; 
The other hid, and doth obliquely bend. 

One life is wrapt in flesh, and tends to earth; 
The other winds toward Him, Whose happie birth 
Taught me to live here so that still one eye 
Should aim and shoot at that which is on high; 
Quitting with daily labour all my pleasure. 
To gain at harvest an eternal Treasure. 

George Herbert 
231 

Vital spark of heav'nly flame! 
Quit, oh quit this mortal frame: 
Trembling, hoping, ling'ring, flying. 
Oh the pain, the bliss of dying! 



144 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Cease, fond Nature, cease thy strife, 
And let me languish into life. 

Hark! they whisper; Angels say, 
Sister Spirit, come away. 
What is this absorbs me quite? 
Steals my senses, shuts my sight. 
Drowns my spirits, draws my breath? 
Tell me, my Soul, can this be Death? 

The world recedes, it disappears! 

Heav'n opens on my eyes! my ears 

With sounds seraphic ring: 

Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly! 

Grave! Where is thy Victory? 

Death! Where is thy Sting? 

Alexander Pope 

232 

They are all gone into the world of light! 

And I alone sit lingering here; 
Their very memory is fair and bright, 

And my sad thoughts doth clear. . . , 

I see them walking in an air of glory, 
Whose light doth trample on my days: 

My days, which are at best but dull and hoary, 
Mere glimmering and decays. . . . 

Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the just, 

Shining nowhere, but in the dark; 
What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust, 

Could man outlook that mark! 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 145 

He that hath found some fledged bird's nest, may know 

At first sight, if the bird be flown; 
But what fair well or grove he sings in now 

That is to him unknown. 

And yet, as Angels in some brighter dreams 

Call to the soul, when man doth sleep; 
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes, 

And into glory peep. 

H. Vaughan 

233 

Thou, as a gallant bark from Albion's coast 

(The storms all weathered and the ocean crossed) 

Shoots into port at some well-havened isle, 

Where spices breathe, and brighter seasons smile, 

There sits quiescent on the floods that show 

Her beauteous form reflected clear below. 

While airs impregnated with incense play 

Around her, fanning light her streamers gay: 

So thou, with sails how swift! hast reached the shore, 

" Where tempests never beat nor billows roar," 

And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide 

Of life, long since has anchored by thy side. . . . 

William Cowper 

234 

Should Fate command me to the farthest verge 
Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, 
Rivers unknown to song . . . 'tis nought to me, 
Since God is ever present, ever felt. 
In the void waste as in the city full, 



146 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

And where he vital spreads there must be joy. 
When even at last the solemn Hour shall come, 
And wing my mystic flight to future worlds, 
I cheerful will obey; there, with new powers, 
With rising wonders sing: I cannot go 
Where Universal Love not smiles around, 
Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their sons; 
From seeming Evil still educing Good, 
And better thence again, and better still, 
In infinite progression. — But I lose 
Myself in Him, in Light ineffable. . . . 

James Thomson 

235 

In Nature everything is connected, like body and spirit. 
Our future destination is a new link in the chain of being, 
which connects itself with the present link most minutely, 
and by the most subtle progression; as our earth is con- 
nected with the sim, and as the moon is connected with the 
earth. 

When death bursts the bonds of limitation, God will 
transplant us, like flowers, into quite other fields, and 
surround us with entirely different circumstances. Who 
has not experienced what new faculties are given to the 
soul by a new situation — faculties which, in our old 
comer, in the stifling atmosphere of old circumstances and 
occupations, we had never imagined ourselves capable of. 

In these matters we can do nothing but conjecture. But 
wherever I may be, through whatever worlds I may be 
led, I know that I shall for ever remain in the hands 
of the Father who brought me hither, and who calls me 
further on. 

Herder 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 147 

236 

All, all on earth is ^adow, all beyond 
Is substance; the reverse is folly's creed: . . . 
This is the bud of being, the dim dawn, 
The twilight of our day, the vestibule. 
Life's theatre as yet is shut, and death, 
Strong death, alone can heave the massy bar, 
This gross impediment of clay remove. 
And make us embryos of existence free. 
From real life, but little more remote, 
Is he not yet a candidate for light. 
The future embryo, slumb'ring in his sire. 
Embryos we must be, till we burst the shell. 
Yon ambient azure shell, and spring to life. 
The life of Gods, transport! and of man. 

Edward Young 

237 

. . . Tell me, ye shining hosts 
That navigate a sea that knows no storms, 
Beneath a vault unsullied with a cloud, 
If from your elevation, whence ye view 
Distinctly scenes invisible to man, 
And systems of whose birth no tidings yet 
Have reached this nether world, ye spy a race 
Favoured as ours, transgressors from the womb. 
And hasting to a grave, yet doomed to rise. 
And to possess a brighter heaven than yours? 
As one who long detained on foreign shores 
Pants to return, and when he sees afar 
His country's weather-bleached and battered rocks 
From the green wave emerging, darts an eye 
Radiant with joy towards the happy land, 



148 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

So I with animated hopes behold, 

And many an aching wish, your beamy fires, 

That show like beacons in the blue abyss, 

Ordained to guide the embodied spirit home, 

From toilsome life to never-ending rest. 

Love kindles as I gaze, I feel desires 

That give assurance of their own success, 

And that, infused from Heaven, must thither tend. 

William Cowper 

238 

Two things there are which, the oftener and the more 
steadfastly we consider them, fill the mind with an ever 
new and ever rising admiration and reverence: the starry 
heaven above, the moral law within. Both I contemplate 
lying clear before me, and connect both immediately with 
the consciousness of my own existence. The one begins 
from the place I occupy in the outer world of sense; 
expands, beyond the bounds of imagination, the connec- 
tion of my body with it into a union with worlds rising 
beyond worlds, and systems blending into systems; and 
protends it also into the illimitable times of their periodic 
movement, their commencement and duration. The other 
begins with my invisible self, with my personality, and 
represents me in a world truly infinite, indeed, but whose 
infinity can be tracked out only by the intellect, and my 
connection with which ... I am compelled to recognize 
as universal and necessary. In the former, the first view 
of a countless multitude of worlds annihilates, as it were, 
my importance as an animal creation. The other, on the 
contrary, immeasurably elevates my worth as an intelli- 
gence; and this through my personality, in which the moral 
law reveals to me a life independent of the animal king- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 149 

dom, . . . which is not restricted by the conditions and 
limits of this life, but stretches out into eternity. 

Immanuel Kant 

239 

In perceiving the order, the prodigious skill, and the 
mechanical and geometrical laws that reign in the imi- 
verse, their causes and the innumerable ends of all things, 
I am seized with admiration and respect. I immediately 
judge that if the works of man, even my own, compel me 
to acknowledge an intelligence within us, I should acknowl- 
edge one far more superior actuating the multitude of so 
many works. I admit of this supreme intelligence, without 
fearing that I shall be obliged to change my opinion. 
Nothing staggers me with respect to this axiom, every work 
demonstrates a workman. 

Is this intelligence eternal ? Doubtless, for whether I 
admit or reject the eternity of matter, I cannot reject the 
eternal existence of its supreme artisan; and it is evident 
that if it exists at present, it ever has existed. . . . 

We are far from pretending to any certainty that what 
we call " soul " in the brutes perishes with them; we are 
well assured matter never perishes at all; and we are of 
opinion that it is possible God may have endowed animals 
with somewhat that may retain to all eternity, if God so 
please, the faculty of forming ideas. We are very far 
from asserting that the thing is really and certainly so; 
and it belongs not to man to be so confident of himself; 
but we dare not set bounds to the power of the Deity. 
We say it is extremely probable that the brutes, which are 
mere matter, may have received from Him a certain por- 
tion of intelligence. We discover daily certain properties 
of matter; that is to say, so many gifts of the Deity, whereof 
we had no manner of conception. 



150 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

, . . There is undoubtedly some property in light, which 
distinguishes it from all other kinds of matter: it would 
seem that light is a kind of middle substance between bodies 
and the other kinds of entities, of which we are wholly 
ignorant. It is very probable that those other species of 
matter are themselves a certain middle rank which leads to 
other creatures, and that there may be, in this maimer, a 
certain chain of substances which rise to infinity. 

This idea seems to us worthy of the greatness of God, if 
ever any was or can be so. Among these substances He 
might no doubt have chosen one, in order to place it in our 
body, which is known by the name of " the human soul " ; 
the sacred books which we have read tell us this soul is 
immortal. Reason in this point agrees with revelation; 
for how is it possible that any substance should perish? 
And if all nature is destroyed, yet being must ever exist. 
We cannot conceive such a thing as the creation of a sub- 
stance; and it is equally impossible for us to form any 
idea of its annihilation. 

. . . Let us, therefore, live in peace like brothers who 
adore one common father. . . . We have but a span of 
existence to enjoy. Let us then enjoy it in peace, without 
falling together by the ears for quibbles and knotty ques- 
tions, which will be better resolved on our entering that 
boundless ocean of eternity, which begins the moment our 
hour-glass is entirely spent. 

Voltaire 

240 

I believe in God as fully as I believe in any other truth. 
If God exists, he is perfect; if he is perfect, he is wise, al- 
mighty and just; if he is just and almighty, my soul is im- 
mortal. 

/. /. Rousseau 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 151 

241 

There is nothing more awful than to attempt to cast 
a glance among the clouds and mists which hide the broken 
extremity of the celebrated bridge in Mirza. Yet, when 
every day brings us nigher that termination, one would 
almost think our views should become clearer. Alas! it is 
not so : there is a curtain to be withdrawn, a veil to be rent, 
before we shall see things as they really are. There are 
few, I trust, who disbelieve the existence of a God; nay, 
I doubt if at all times, and in all moods, any single in- 
dividual ever adopted that . . . creed, though some have 
professed it. With the belief of a Deity, that of the im- 
mortality of the soul ... is indissolubly linked. . . . 
There is a God, and a just God — a judgment and a future 
life — and all who own so much, let them act according to 
the faith that is in them. 

Sir Walter Scott 

242 

Unfading Hope! when life's last embers burn. 
When soul to soul, and dust to dust return! 
Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour! 
Oh! then, thy kingdom comes! Immortal Power! 
What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly 
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye! 
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey 
The morning dream of life's eternal day. . . . 

Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume 
The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb; 
Melt, and dispel, ye spectre-doubts, that roll 
Cimmerian darkness o'er the parting soul! 
Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay, 



152 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Chased on his night-steed by the star of day ! 
The strife is o'er — the pangs of nature close, 
And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes. 



Soul of the just! companion of the dead! 
Where is thy home, and whither art thou fled? 
Back to its heavenly source thy being goes. 
Swift as the comet wheels to whence he rose. . . . 
From planet whirl'd to planet more remote. 
He visits realms beyond the reach of thought; 
But wheeling homeward, when his course is run, 
Curbs the red yoke, and mingles with the sun ! 
So hath the traveller of earth unfurl'd 
Her trembling wings, emerging from the world; 
And o'er the path by mortal never trod. 
Sprung to her source, the bosom of her God! 

Thomas Campbell 

243 

A being in whom the thought of immortality can arise, 
cannot be mortal. 

/. P. Richter 

244 

I should be the very last man to dispense with faith 
in a future life. I have a firm conviction that the soul 
is an existence of an indestructible nature, whose working 
is from eternity to eternity. It is like the sun, which seems 
indeed to set, but really never sets, shining on in unchange- 
able splendour. 

Goethe 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 153 

245 

To me the eternal existence of my soul is proved from 
my idea of activity. If I work incessantly till my death, 
nature is bound to give me another form of existence when 
the present can no longer sustain my spirit. 

Goethe 

246 

The belief in immortality is by no means incompatible 
with atheism: for the same Necessity which in this life 
threw my shining dewdrop of Me into a flower-bell and 
under a sun, can repeat the process in a second life; in- 
deed, it can embody me more easily the second time than 
the first. 

/. P. Richter 

247 

I trouble not myself about the manner of future exist- 
ence. I content myself with believing, even to positive 
conviction, that the Power which gave me existence is 
able to continue it in any form and in any manner he 
pleases, either with or without this body; and it appears 
more probable to me that I shall continue to exist here- 
after, than that I should have existence as I now have, be- 
fore that existence began. 

Thomas Paine 

248 

The consciousness of existence is the only conceivable 
idea we can have of another life, and the continuance of 
that consciousness is immortality. The consciousness of 



154 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

existence or the knowing that we exist, is not necessarily 
confined to the same form, nor to the same matter, even 
in this life. 

We have not in all cases the same form, nor in any case 
the same matter that composed our bodies twenty or thirty 
years ago; and yet we are conscious of being the same 
persons. . . . We know not how much, or rather how little, 
of our composition it is, and how exquisitely fine that little 
is, that creates in us this consciousness of existence; and 
all beyond is like the pulp of a peach, distinct and sepa- 
rate from the vegetative speck in the kernel. Who can say 
by what exceedingly fine action of fine matter it is that a 
thought is produced in what we call the mind? And 
yet that thought when produced, as I now produce the 
thought I am writing, is capable of becoming immortal, and 
is the only production of man that has that capacity. 

Thomas Paine 



249 

The body of Benjamin Franklin, printer (like the cover 
of an old book, its contents torn out, and stripped of its 
lettering and gilding), lies here food for worms, but the 
work itself shall not be lost, for it will (as he believed) 
appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, 
corrected and amended by the author. 

Benjamin Franklin 

250 

Life is a state of embryo, a preparation for life. A 
man is not completely born until he has passed through 
death. 

Benjamin Franklin 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 155 



251 



All Death is Nature in Birth, and in Death itself ap- 
pears visibly the exaltation of Life. There is no destruc- 
tive principle in Nature, for Nature throughout is pure 
unclouded Life; it is not Death that kills, but the more un- 
clouded Life which concealed behind the former, bursts 
forth into new development. Death and Birth are but the 
struggle of Life with itself to assume a more glorious and 
congenial form. And my death, — how can it be aught 
else, since I am not a mere show and semblance of life, 
but bear within me the one original, true and essential 
Life? It is impossible to conceive that Nature should 
annihilate a life which does not proceed from her; — the 
Nature which exists for me and not I for her. . . . Even 
because she destroys me must she animate me anew; it 
is only my Higher Life, unfolding itself in her, before 
which my present life can disappear; and what mortals 
call Death is the visible appearance of this second Life. 
Did no reasonable being who has once beheld the light 
of this world die, there would be no ground to look with 
faith for a new heavens and a new earth; the only pos- 
sible purpose of Nature, to manifest and maintain Reason, 
would be fulfilled here below, and her circle would be 
completed. But the very act by which she consigns a 
free and independent being to death, is her own solemn 
entrance, intelligible to all Reason, into a region beyond 
this act itself, and beyond the world-sphere of existence 
which is thereby closed. Death is the ladder by which my 
spiritual vision rises to a new Life and a new Nature. 

Every one of my fellow creatures who leaves this earthly 
brotherhood and whom, because he is my brother, my 
spirit cannot regard as annihilated, draws my thoughts 
after him beyond the grave ; — he is still, and to him 



156 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

there belongs a place. While we mourn for him here 
below, — as, in the dim realms of our Consciousness there 
might be mourning when a man bursts from them into the 
light of this world's sun, — above there is rejoicing that a 
man is born into that world, as we citizens of the earth 
receive with joy those who are born unto us. When I 
shall one day follow, it will be but joy for me; sorrow 
shall remain behind in the sphere I shall have left. 

Fichte 

252 

I do not, by empty words of consolation, want to tear 
open again the wounds of your sorrow, but there is one 
consolation for both of us, that the time is not distant when 
our suffering and mourning bodies will be lain at rest for 
a happy reunion with those we have loved and lost, and 
we shall love for ever and never lose again. 

Thomas Jefferson 

253 

But is this continuation of the person possible? After 
the dissolution of the body, can anything of us remain? 
In truth, the moral person which acts well or ill, ... is 
united to a body, makes use of it, and, in a certain measure, 
depends upon it, but is not it. The body is composed of 
parts, may decrease or increase; is divisible, essentially 
divisible and even infinitely divisible. But that some- 
thing that has consciousness of itself, that says /, me, that 
feels itself to be free and responsible, does it not also feel 
that there is in it no division, that it is a being one and 
simple? ... It remains identical to itself under the 
diversity of the phenomena that manifest it. That iden- 
tity, that indivisibility of the person, is its spirituality. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 157 

Spirituality is, therefore, the very essence of the person. 
. . . The spirituality of the soul is the necessary founda- 
tion of immortality. 

Whatever he [man] does, whatever he feels, whatever 
he thinks, he thinks upon the infinite, loves the infinite, 
tends to the infinite. This need of the infinite is the 
mainspring of scientific curiosity, the principle of all dis- 
coveries. Love also stops and rests only there. ... Fi- 
nally, like thought and love, human activity is without limits. 
Who can say where it shall stop? Behold this world al- 
most known. Soon another world will be necessary for 
us. Man is journeying toward the infinite which is always 
receding before him, which he always pursues. He con- 
ceives it, he feels it, he bears it, thus to speak, in himself, 
— how should his end be elsewhere? Hence that uncon- 
querable instinct of immortality, that universal hope of 
another life to which all worships, all poesies, all tradi- 
tions bear witness. We tend to the infinite with all our 
powers; death comes to interrupt the destiny that seeks 
its goal, and overtakes it unfinished. It is, therefore, likely 
that there is something after death, since in death nothing 
in us is terminated. . . . My perfection, my moral per- 
fection, that of which I have the clearest idea and the 
most invincible need, for which I feel that I am born, — 
in vain I call for it, in vain I labour for it; it escapes me, 
and leaves me only hope. Shall this hope be deceived? 
... A being that should remain incomplete and unfinished, 
that should not attain the end which all his instincts pro- 
claim for him, would be a monster in the eternal order, — 
a problem much more difficult to solve than the difficulties 
which have been raised against the immortality of the 
soul. In our opinion, this tendency of all our desires and 
all the powers of the soul towards the infinite, elucidated 
by the principle of final causes, is a serious and important 



158 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

confirmation of the moral proof and metaphysical proof 
of another life. 

M. Victor Cousin 

254 

Then is nature itself nothing less than the ladder oi 
resurrection, which, step by step, leads upwards, or rather 
is carried from the abyss of eternal death up to the apex 
of light in the heavenly illumination. For, understanding 
it in this sense, it is impossible to think of nature without 
remembering at the same time the divine hand which has 
built this pyramid, and which, along this ladder, brings 
life out of death. This view, moreover, accounts for the 
fact, that a state of slumber is essential to nature — and 
furnishes an explanation why this perpetually-recurring 
collapse into sleep, which to us appears so near akin 
to death, should be nature's proper character. And just 
as the consuming fire of death appears in the more highly 
organized beings to be somewhat subdued and restrained, 
mitigated or exalted into the quickening warmth of life, 
so also sleep is only the more than half enlightened brother 
of death. And indeed as such, and the lovely messenger 
of hope to immortal spirits, was he ever regarded and de- 
scribed by the ancients; but that which for them was little 
more than a beautiful image of poetry, is for us the pro- 
foundest of truths. 

Frederick von Schlegel 

255 

How wonderful is Death, 
Death and his brother Sleep! 
One, pale as yonder waning moon 
With lips of lurid blue! 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 159 

The other, rosy as the mom 
When throned on ocean's wave 

It blushes o'er the world: 
Yet both so passing wonderful! 

Percy Bysshe Shelley 

256 

We watched her breathing thro' the night, 

Her breathing soft and low. 
And in her breast the wave of life 

Kept heaving to and fro. 

So silently we seemed to speak, 

So slowly moved about, 
As we had lent her half our powers 

To eke her living out. 

Our very hopes belied our fears, 

Our fears our hopes belied — 
We thought her dying when she slept. 

And sleeping when she died. 

For when the mom came dim and sad 

And chill with early showers. 
Her quiet eyelids closed — she had 

Another morn than ours. 

Thomas Hood 

257 

Asia — Oh, mother! wherefore speak the name of death? 
Cease they to love, and move, and breathe, and 

speak, 
Who die? 



I 



160 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

The Earth — It would avail not to reply : 

Thou art immortal, and this tongue is known 
But to the uncommunicating dead. 
Death is the veil which those who live call life: 
They sleep, and it is lifted. . . . 

Percy Bysshe Shelley 

258 

I weep for Adonais — he is dead! 

Oh weep for Adonais! though our tears 

Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head! 

And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years 

To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers, 

And teach them thine own sorrow ! Say : " With me 

Died Adonais; till the Future dares 

Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be 

An echo and a light unto eternity! "... 

Oh weep for Adonais — he is dead! 
Wake, melancholy Mother, wake and weep! 
Yet wherefore? Quench within their burning bed 
Thy fiery tears, and let thy loud heart keep 
Like his, a mute and uncomplaining sleep; 
For he is gone, where all things wise and fair 
Descend; — oh, dream not that the amorous Deep 
Will yet restore him to the vital air; 
Death feeds on his mute voice, and laughs at our de- 
spair. . . . 

Oh weep for Adonais! — The quick Dreams, 
The passion-winged Ministers of thought. 
Who were his flocks, whom near the living streams 
Of his young spirit fed, and whom he taught 






THE GRAIL OF LIFE 161 

The love which was its music, wander not — 

Wander no more, from kindling brain to brain, 

But droop there, whence they sprung; and mourn their 

lot 
Round the cold heart, where, after their sweet pain, 
They ne'er will gather strength, or find a home again. . . . 

Alas! that all we loved of him should be, 
But for our grief, as if it had not been. 
And grief itself be mortal ! Woe is me ! 
Whence are we, and why are we? of what scene 
The actors or spectators? Great and mean 
Meet massed in death, who lends what life must borrow. 
As long as skies are blue, and fields are green. 
Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow, 
Month follow month with woe, and year wake year with 
sorrow. . . . 

[Yet] peace ! he is not dead, he doth not sleep — 

He hath awakened from the dream of life — 

'Tis we, who lost in stormy visions, keep 

With phantoms an unprofitable strife, 

And in mad trance, strike with our spirit's knife 

Invulnerable nothings. — We decay 

Like corpses in a charnel; fear and grief 

Convulse us and consume us day by day, 

And cold hopes swarm like worms within the living clay. 

He has outsoared the shadow of our night, 
Envy and calumny and hate and pain. 
And that unrest which men miscall delight, 
Can touch him not and torture not again; 
From the contagion of the world's slow stain 
He is secure, and now can never mourn 



162 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

A heart grown cold, a head grown grey in vain; 
Nor, when the spirit's self has ceased to burn, 
With sparkless ashes load an unlamented urn. 

He lives, he wakes — 'tis Death is dead, not he; 
Mourn not for Adonais. — Thou young Dawn, 
Turn all thy dew to splendour, for from thee 
The spirit thou lamented is not gone; 
Ye caverns and ye forests, cease to mourn! 
Cease ye faint flowers and fountains, and thou Air 
Which like a mourning veil thy scarf hadst thrown 
O'er the abandoned Earth, now leave it bare 
Even to the joyous stars which smile on its despair! 

He is made one with Nature: there is heard 
His voice in all her music, from the moan 
Of thunder to the song of night's sweet bird; 
He is a presence to be felt and known 
In darkness and in light, from herb and stone, 
Spreading itself where'er that Power may move 
Which has withdrawn his being to its own; 
Which wields the world with never wearied love. 
Sustains it from beneath, and kindles it above. 

He is a portion of the loveliness 

Which once he made more lovely ; he doth bear 

His part, while the one Spirit's plastic stress 

Sweeps through the dull dense world, compelling there 

All new successions to the forms they wear; 

Torturing the unwilling dross that checks its flight 

To its own likeness, as each mass may bear; 

And bursting in its beauty and its might 

From trees and beasts and men into the Heaven's light. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 163 

The splendours of the firmanent of time 

May be eclipsed, but are extinguished not; 

Like stars to their appointed height they climb 

And death is a low mist which cannot blot 

The brightness it may veil. When lofty thought 

Lifts a young heart above its mortal lair, 

And love and life contend in it, for what 

Shall be its earthly doom, the dead live there 

And move like winds of light on dark and stormy air. . . . 

The One remains, the many change and pass; 

Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly; 

Life, like a dome of many-colored glass. 

Stains the white radiance of Eternity, 

Until Death tramples it to fragments. — Die, 

If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek! 

Follow where all is fled! . . . 

That Light whose smile kindles the Universe, 
That Beauty in which all things work and move, 
That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse 
Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love 
Which through the web of being blindly wove 
By man and beast and earth and air and sea, 
Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of 
The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me, 
Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality. 

The breath whose might I have invoked in song 
Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven, 
Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng 
Whose sails were never to the tempest given; 
The massy earth and sphered skies are riven! 
I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar; 



164 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Whilst burning through the inmost veil of Heaven, 

The soul of Adonais, like a star, 

Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are. 

Percy Bysshe Shelley 

259 

The thought of immortality is a luminous sea in which 
he who bathes is all surrounded by stars. 

/. P, Richter 

260 

. . . Believe thou, my soul, 
Life is a vision shadowy of Truth; 
And vice, and anguish, and the wormy grave. 
Shapes of a dream! The veiling clouds retire. 
And lo! the throne of the redeeming God, 
Forth flashing imimaginable day, 
Wraps in one blaze earth, heaven and deepest hell. 

Contemplant Spirits ! ye that hover o'er 
With untired gaze the immeasurable fount 
Ebullient with creative Deity! 
And ye of plastic power, that interfused 
Roll through the grosser and material mass 
In organizing surge! Holies of God! ... 
I haply journeying my inmiortal course 
Shall sometime join your mystic choir. . . . 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge 

261 

... To me the past presents 
No object for regret; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 165 

To me the present gives 

All cause for full content. 
The future? — it is now the cheerful noon, 
And on the sunny-smiling fields I gaze 

With eyes alive to joy: 

When the dark night descends, 
I willingly shall close my weary lids. 
In sure and certain hope to wake again. 

Robert Southey 

262 

When coldness wraps this suffering clay, 

Ah! whither strays the immortal mind? 
It cannot die, it cannot stray. 

But leaves its darkened dust behind. 
Then, unembodied, doth it trace 

By steps each planet's heavenly way? 
Or fill at once the realms of space, 

A thing of eyes, that all survey? 

Eternal, boundless, undecayed, 

A thought unseen, but seeing all, 
All, all in earth, or skies displayed, 

Shall it survey, shall it recall: 
Each fainter trace that memory holds 

So darkly of departed years, 
In one broad glance the soul beholds, 

And all, that was, at once appears. 

Before Creator peopled earth. 

Its eye shall roll through chaos back; 

And where the furthest heaven had birth, 
The spirit trace its rising track, 



166 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

And where the future mars or makes, 

Its glance dilate o'er all to be, 
While sun is quenched or system breaks, 

Fixed in its own Eternity. 

Above or Love, Hope, Hate or Fear, 

It lives all passionless and pure: 
An age shall fleet like earthly years; 

Its years as moments shall endure. 
Away, away, without a wing, 

O'er all, through all, its thought shall fly; 
A nameless and eternal thing. 

Forgetting what it was to die. 

Lord Byron 



263 



There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, 
The earth, and every common sight. 
To me did seem 
Apparelled in celestial light. 
The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
It is not now as it hath been of yore; — 
Turn wheresoe'er I may. 
By night or day. 
The things which I have seen I now can see no more. 



II 



The Rainbow comes and goes 
And lovely is the Rose, 
The Moon doth with delight 
Look round her when the heavens are bare. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 167 

Waters on a starry night 

Are beautiful and fair; 
The sunshine is a glorious birth; 
But yet I know, where'er I go, 
That there hath past away a glory from the earth. 

Ill 

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song 
And while the young lambs bound 
As to the tabor's sound, 
To me alone there came a thought of grief: 
A timely utterance gave that thought relief, 

And I again am strong: 
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep; 
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong; 
I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng. 
The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep, 
And all the earth is gay; 
Land and sea 
Give themselves up to jollity, 
And with the heart of May 
Doth every Beast keep holiday; — 
Thou Child of Joy, 
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy 
Shepherd-boy! 



IV 



Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call 

Ye to each other make; I see 
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee; 

My heart is at your festival. 

My head hath its coronal. 



168 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

The fulness of your bliss, I feel — I feel it all. 

Oh evil day! if I were sullen 

While Earth herself is adoring 
This sweet May-morning, 

And the Children are culling 
On every side, 

In a thousand valleys far and wide, 

Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm, 
And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm; - 

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! 
— But there's a Tree, of many, one, 
A single Field which I have looked upon. 
Both of them speak of something that is gone: 

The Pansy at my feet 

Doth the same tale repeat: 
Whither is fled the visionary gleam? 
Where is it now, the glory and the dream? 



Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: 
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, 

Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
And Cometh from afar: 

Not in entire forgetfulness, 

And not in utter nakedness. 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 

From God, who is our home: 
Heaven lies about us in our infancy! 
Shades of the prison-house begin to close 

Upon the growing boy, 
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows, 

He sees it in his joy; 
The Youth, who daily farther from the east 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 169 

Must travel, still is Nature's Priest, 

And by the vision splendid 

Is on his way attended; 
At length the Man perceives it die away, 
And fade into the light of common day. 

VI 

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; 
Yearning she hath in her own natural kind, 
And, even with something of a Mother's mind, 

And no unworthy aim. 

The homely Nurse doth all she can 
To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man, 

Forget the glories he hath known, 
And that imperial palace when he came. 

VII 

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses, 
A six years' Darling of a pigmy size! 
See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies. 
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses. 
With light upon him from his father's eyes! 
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart. 
Some fragment from his dream of human life. 
Shaped by himself with newly-learned art; 

A wedding or a festival, 

A mourning or a funeral; 

And this hath now his heart; 

And unto this he frames his song: 
Then will he fit his tongue 
To dialogues of business, love, or strife; 

But it will not be long 



170 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Ere this be thrown aside, 

And with new joy and pride 
The little Actor cons another part; 
Filling from time to time his "humourous stage" 
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age, 
That Life brings with her in her equipage; 

As if his whole vocation 

Were endless imitation. 

VIII 

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie 

Thy Soul's immensity; 
Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep 
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind, 
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep, 
Haunted for ever by the eternal mind, — 

Mighty Prophet! Seer blest! 

On whom those truths do rest. 
Which we are toiling all our lives to find, 
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave; 
Thou, over whom thy Immortality 
Broods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave, 
A Presence which is not to be put by; 
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might 
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height. 
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke 
Thy years to bring the inevitable yoke, 
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife? 
Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight, 
And custom lie upon thee with a weight. 
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life! 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 171 



IX 



joy! that in our embers 
Is something that doth live, 
That nature yet remembers 
What was so fugitive! 
The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
Perpetual benediction: not indeed 
For that which is most worthy to be blest — 
Delight and liberty, the simple creed 
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest. 
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast; 
Not for these I raise 
The song of thanks and praise; 
But for those obstinate questionings 
Of sense and outward things. 
Fallings from us, vanishings; 
Blank misgivings of a Creature 
Moving about in worlds not realized, 
High instincts before which our mortal Nature 
Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised: 
But for those first affections. 
Those shadowy recollections. 
Which, be they what they may. 
Are yet the fountain light of all our day, 
Are yet a master light of all our seeing; 

Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make 
Our noisy years seem moments in the being 
Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake, 

To perish never; 
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour, 

Nor Man nor Boy, 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 
Can utterly abolish or destroy! 



172 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Hence in a season of calm weather 

Though inland far we be, 
Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea 

Which brought us hither, 

Can in a moment travel thither, 
And see the Children sport upon the shore. 
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. 



Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing, a joyous song! 

And let the young Lambs bound 

As to the tabor's soimd! 
We in thought will join your throng. 

Ye that pipe and ye that play. 

Ye that through your hearts today 

Feel the gladness of the May! 
What though the radiance which was once so bright 
Be now for ever taken from my sight. 

Though nothing can bring back the hour 
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower; 

We will grieve not, rather find 

Strength in what remains behind; 

In the primal sympathy 

Which having been must ever be; 

In the soothing thoughts that spring 

Out of human suffering; 

In the faith that looks through death. 
In the years that bring the philosophic mind. 

XI 

And 0, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves, 
Forebode not any severing of oiur loves! 
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 173 

I only have relinquished one delight 

To live beneath your more habitual sway. 

I love the Brooks which down their channels fret, 

Even more than when I tripped lightly as they; 

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day 

Is lovely yet; 
The Clouds that gather round the setting sun 
Do take a sober colouring from an eye 
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; 
Another race hath been, and other palms are won. 
Thanks to the himaan heart by which we live. 
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears. 
To me the meanest flower that blows can give 
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 

William Wordsworth 

264 

Life, I repeat, is energy of love 
Divine or human; exercised in pain. 
In strife, and tribulation ; and ordained. 
If so approved and sanctified, to pass. 
Through shades and silent rest, to endless joy. 

William Wordsworth 

265 

Beneath the waning moon I walk at night. 
And muse on human life — for all around 

Are dim uncertain shapes that cheat the sight. 
And pitfalls lurk in shade along the ground, 

And broken gleams of brightness, here and there, 

Glance through, and leave unwarmed the deathlike air. 

The trampled earth returns a sound of fear — 
A hollow sound, as if I walked on tombs; 



174 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

And lights, that tell of cheerful homes, appear 

Far off, and die like hope amid the glooms 
A mournful wind across the landscape flies, 
And the wide atmosphere is full of sighs. 

And I, with faltering footsteps, journey on, 
Watching the stars that roll the hours away, 

Till the faint light that guides me now is gone. 
And, like another life, the glorious day 

Shall open o'er me from empyreal height. 

With warmth, and certainty, and boundless light. 

William Cullen Bryant 

266 

Mysterious Night! when our first Parent knew 

Thee from report divine, and heard thy name. 

Did he not tremble for this lovely frame, 

This glorious canopy of light and blue? 

Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew. 

Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame, 

Hesperus with the host of heaven came; 

And lo. Creation widened in man's view. 

Who could have thought such darkness lay concealed 

Within thy beams, Sun? or who could find. 

Whilst fly and leaf and insect stood revealed. 

That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind? 

Why do we then shun Death with anxious strife? 

If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life? 

Blanco White 

267 

How full, how bright, are the evidences of this grand 
truth! How weak are the common arguments which 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 175 

scepticism arrays against it! To me there is but one ob- 
jection against immortality . . . and this arises from the 
very greatness of the truth. My mind sometimes sinks 
under its weight, is lost in its immensity; I scarcely dare 
believe that such a good is placed within my reach. When 
I think of myself as existing through all future ages, as 
surviving this earth and that sky, as exempted from every 
imperfection and error of my present being ... as com- 
prehending with my intellect and embracing in my affec- 
tions an extent of creation compared with which the earth 
is a point . . . when this thought of my future comes 
to me, whilst I hope, I also fear; the blessedness seems 
too great; the consciousness of present weakness and un- 
worthiness is almost too strong for hope. But when in 
this frame of mind I look round on the creation, and see 
there the marks of an omnipotent goodness, to which noth- 
ing is impossible, and from which everything may be 
hoped; when I see around me the proofs of an Infinite 
Father who must desire the perpetual progress of his in- 
tellectual offspring; when I look next at the human mind, 
and see what powers a few years have unfolded, and dis- 
cern in it the capacity of everlasting improvement ... I 
can and do admit the almost overpowering thought of the 
everlasting life, growth, felicity of the human soul. 

William Ellery Channing 

268 

The immortality of the soul must not be represented as 
first entering the sphere of reality only at a later stage; 
it is the actual present quality of Spirit; Spirit is eternal, 
and for this reason is already present. Spirit, as possessed 
of freedom, does not belong to the sphere of things limited ; 
it, as being what thinks and knows in an absolute way, has 



176 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

the Universal for its object; this is eternity, which is not 
simply duration, as duration can be predicated of 
mountains, but knowledge. 

. . . Man is immortal in consequence of knowledge, 
for it is only as a thinking being that he is not a mortal 
animal soul and is a free, pure soul. Reasoned knowledge, 
thought, is the root of his life, of his immortality as a 
totality in himself. The animal soul is sirnk in the life of 
the body, while Spirit, on the other hand, is a totality in 
itself. 

Hegel 

269 

Here is this wonderful thought [of immortality]. But 
whence came it? Who put it in the mind? It was not 
I, it was not you; it is elemental — belongs to thought and 
virtue, and whenever we have either, we see the beams 
of this light. When the Master of the universe has points 
to carry in his government, he impresses his will in the 
structure of minds. . . . 

. . . Wherever man ripens, this audacious belief 
presently appears. ... As soon as thought is exercised, 
this belief is inevitable; as soon as virtue glows, this belief 
confirms itself. It is a kind of summary or completion of 
man. . . . The doctrine is not sentimental, but is grounded 
in the necessities and forces we possess. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

270 

Man is greater than his expectations, a spirit incarnate, 
and is at once the occupant of two worlds. The Person 
is immortal. 

. . . Were man personally finite, he could not conceive of 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 177 

infinity; were he mortal, he could not think immortality. 
Whatever had a beginning comes of necessity to its end, 
since it has not the principle of perpetuity inherent in it- 
self. And there is that in man which cannot think an- 
nihilation, but thinks continuance. All life is eternal; 
there is no other. 

A, Bronson Alcott 

271 

It is the belief of mankind that we shall all live for 
ever. This is not a doctrine of Christianity alone. It 
belongs to the human race. You may find nations so rude 
that they live houseless, in caverns of the earth; nations 
that have no letters, not knowing the use of bows and ar- 
rows, fire, or even clothes; but no nation without a belief 
in inmiortal life. ... 

Immortality is a fact of man's nature. ... It comes to 
our consciousness as naturally as the notions of time and 
space. . . . What is thus in man is writ there of God, who 
writes no lies. ... I feel the longing after immortality — 
a desire essential to my nature, deep as the foundation 
of my being; I find the same desire in all men. I feel 
conscious of immortality ; that I am not to die — no, never 
to die, though often to change. I cannot believe this de- 
sire and consciousness are felt only to mislead, to beguile, 
to deceive me. I know God is my Father; and the Father 
of the nations. Can the Almighty deceive his children? 
For my own part, I can conceive of nothing which shall 
make me more certain of my immortality. I ask no argu- 
ment from learned lips. No miracle could make me more 
sure; no, not if the sheeted dead burst cerement and shroud, 
and rising forth from their honoured tombs stood here 
before me — the disenchanted dust once more enchanted 
with that fiery life; no, not if the souls of all my sires 



178 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

since time began came thronging romid, and with 
miraculous speech told me they lived and I should also live. 
I could only say, " I knew all this before; why waste your 
heavenly speech? " 

Theodore Parker 

272 

. . . Spontaneous or considered, the result of thought, 
clear or confused, apparent or hidden, admitted or re- 
pelled, powerful or feeble, permanent or transitory, the 
idea of man's immortality is found in every mind; there 
is no man who does not feel, or propose, to do things 
whose final object is beyond the tomb, which he would 
not do, he would not intend, and he would not feel the 
desire to do, if the idea of immortality was not in him. 
. . . The instinct of immortality is implied in [the] feeling 
of the want of eternal justice, and necessarily precedes 
it. . . . Under their [the disbelievers'] careless levity and 
contempt, there yet subsists and makes itself felt, from 
time to time, the desire for the re-establishment of moral 
order, invincible in the human soul, but still it is no more 
than an inconsequent and blind desire, since it bases it- 
self no longer on the only idea which explains and sustains 
it [like a foundation] — the Idea of Immortality. . . . 

It is considered that the Idea of Immortality comes from 
the insufficiency of the actual world to satisfy the human 
soul, from that immensity of desire which devours the soul 
and cannot even be extinguished by happiness itself, always 
below the measure of expectation and search or exhausted 
by the very enjoyment itself, or ready to escape from its 
grasp or possession. Thence comes, it is argued, that Idea 
of Immortality which opens to the soul perspectives with- 
out limits, and transports it into a world as infinite as its 
desires. ... It is true the world does not satisfy man, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 179 

the only one of created beings who feels himself straitened 
in his dwelling and superior to his actual condition. But 
this sentiment, however, does not discover the hope of 
Immortality in order to satisfy itself; it merely reveals, 
and is only itself, or the consequence. It is the instinct 
of an infinite nature which pushes the ambition of the soul 
beyond the limits of a finite world; it is because this in- 
finite nature feels itself immortal that it aspires to things 
which are not transitory. 

. . . The philosophers . . . undertake to clear up, 
elucidate the natural beliefs, to complete, systematize, ex- 
plain them, and reconcile the facts which reveal them- 
selves therein, to solve the problems which they present. 
. . . They have built up, in the name of this idea [Im- 
mortality] systems which cannot bear examination, and 
by having been metamorphosed into a scientific hypothesis, 
it has fallen into a sort of contempt among those who have 
looked on (the process) and have considered it only under 
this (one) phase. 

It is easy to show that the greater part of the objections 
which the Idea of Immortality of the Soul encounter arise 
from this metamorphosis, and from the illegitimate use 
which science has wished to make of the instinctive belief 
of humanity. 

Happily, humanity is stronger than science and has com- 
pelled it sooner or later to retrace its steps from the 
error into which it has fallen. Not only has the Idea of 
Immortality refused to permit itself to be reduced to this 
role of hypothesis, to which some of its defenders have 
wished to assign it; not only has it continued to reside at 
the bottom of the (well of truth in the) human conscience, 
simple, pure, divested of every characteristic of scienti- 
fic explanation ; it has done more — it has penetrated into 
the very system directed against it, and into the very 



180 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

bosom of inimical hypothesis. If a close examination be 
instituted of these doctrines, which, in ancient and modern 
times, in Asia and Europe, have made a profession of 
repelling the Idea of Immortality, this Idea will be found 
therein more or less indirect, more or less concealed, but 
always invincible in the instinctive perceptions of men, 
and insinuating itself under one form or another in the 
very thought which denies it. So that science, very far 
from having invented it, is subject to it, and harbours or 
conceals it at the very moment it attempts to banish it. 

. . . Man receives the Idea of Immortality neither from 
experience nor from science. The exterior world does not 
furnish him with the Idea; his mind does not invent it. 
It is from the depths of his soul that it wells up within 
him; he feels it, he perceives it, he knows himself to he 
immortal, 

F, P, G. Guizot 



273 

. . . Wilt thou not ope thy heart to know 

"What rainbows teach, and sunsets show? 

Verdict which accumulates 

From lengthening scroll of human fates. 

Voice of earth to earth returned. 

Prayers of saints that inly burned — 

Saying, What is excellent. 

As God lives is permanent; 

Hearts are dust, hearts^ loves remain; 

Heart's love will meet thee again. 

Revere the Maker; fetch thine eye 

Up to his style, and manners of the sky. 

Not of adamant and gold 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 181 

Built he heaven stark and •cold; 
No, but a nest of bending reeds, 
Flowering grass and scented weeds; 
Or like a traveller's fleeing tent, 
Or bow above the tempest bent; 
Built of tears and sacred flames, 
And virtue reaching to its aims; 
Built of furtherance and pursuing. 
Not of spent deeds, but of doing. 
Silent rushes the swift Lord 
Through ruined systems still restored, 
Broadsowing, bleak and void to bless, 
Plants with worlds the wilderness; 
Waters with tears of ancient sorrow 
Apples of Eden ripe tomorrow. 
House and tenant go to ground. 
Lost in God, in Godhead found. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

274 

... Heaven! Is the white Tomb of our Loved One, 
who died from our arms, and had to be left behind us 
there, which rises in the distance, like a pale, mournfully 
receding Mile-stone, to tell how many toilsome uncheered 
miles we have journeyed on alone — but a pale spectral 
Illusion? . . . Know of a truth that only the Time-shadows 
have perished, or are perishable; that the real Being of 
whatever was, and whatever is, and whatever will be, is 
even now and for ever. . . . Are we not Spirits, that are 
shaped into a body, into an Appearance; and that fade 
away again into air and Invisibility? This is no metaphor, 
it is a simple scientific fact; . . . Round us ... is 
Eternity. . . . But whence?— ^0 Heaven, whither? Sense 



182 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

knows not; Faith knows not; only that it is through Mystery 
to Mystery, from God to God. 

Thomas Carlyle 

275 

No coward soul is mine, 
No trembler in the world's storm-trouhled sphere: 

I see Heaven's glories shine, 
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear. 

Vain are the thousand creeds 
That move men's hearts: unutterably vain; 

Worthless as withered weeds, 
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main, 

To waken douht in one 
Holding so fast by thine infinity; 

So surely anchored on 
The steadfast rock of immortality. 

With wide-emh racing love 
Thy spirit animates eternal years. 

Pervades and broods above. 
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears. 

Though earth and man were gone. 
And suns and universes ceased to be. 

And Thou were left alone. 
Every existence would exist in Thee. 

There is no room for Death, 
Nor atom that his might could render void: 

Thou — Thou art Being and Breath 
And what Thou art may never be destroyed. 

Emily Bronte 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 183 

276 

Destruction and salvation are the hands 

Upon the face of time. When both unite, 

The day of death dawns. Every orb exists 

Unto its preappointed end: . . . 

. . . The world shall perish as a worm 

Upon destruction's path; the universe 

Evanish like a ghost before the sun, 

Yea like a doubt before the truth of God, 

Yet nothing more than death shall perish. Then, 

Rejoice ye souls of God . . . 

In Him ye are immortal as Himself! 

Philip James Bailey 

211 

. , . When Earth shall pass away with all 

Her pride and pomp of sin. 
The City builded without hands 

Shall safely shut me in. 
All the rest is but vanity 

Which others strive to win: 
Where their hopes end my joys begin. 

I will not look upon a rose 

Though it is fair to see: 
The flowers planted in Paradise 

Are budding now for me: 
Red roses like love visible 

Are blowing on their tree, 
Or white like virgin purity. 

I will not look upon the sun 
Which setteth night by night: 



■ 



184 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

In the untrodden courts of heaven 
My crown shall be more bright. 

Lo in the New Jerusalem 
Founded and built aright 

My very feet shall tread on light. 

Christina Rossetti 

278 

... I go from earth to heaven 

A dim uncertain road, 
A houseless pilgrim through the world 

Unto a sure abode: 
While evermore an Angel 

Goes with me day and night, 
A ministering spirit 

From the land of light, 
My holy fellow-servant sent 

To guide my steps aright. . . • 

If her spirit went before me 

Up from night to day, 
It would pass me like the lightning 

That kindles on its way. 
I should feel it like the lightning 

Flashing fresh from heaven: 
I should long for heaven sevenfold more, 

Yea and sevenfold seven: 
Should pray as I have not prayed before, 

And strive as I have not striven. ... 

She will learn new love in heaven, 

Who is so full of love; 
She will learn new depths of tenderness 

Who is tender as a dove. 
Her heart will no more sorrow. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 185 

Her eyes will weep no more: 
Yet it may be she will yearn 

And look back from far before: 
Lingering on the golden threshold 

And leaning from the door. 

Christina Rossetti 

279 

... It was the rampart of God's house 

That she was standing on; 
By God built over the sheer depth 

The which is Space begun; 
So high, that looking downward thence 

She scarce could see the sun. . . . 

Around her, lovers, newly met 

'Mid deathless love's acclaims, 
Spoke evermore among themselves 

Their heart-remembered names; 
And the souls mounting up to God 

Went by her like thin flames. ... 

From the fixed place of Heaven she saw 

Time like a pulse shake fierce 
Through all the world. Her gaze still strove 

Within the gulf to pierce 
Its path; and now she spoke as when 

The stars sang in their spheres. 

" I wish that he were come to me, 

For he will come," she said. 
" Have I not prayed in Heaven? — on earth 

Lord, Lord, has he not prayed? 
Are not two prayers a perfect strength? 

And shall I feel afraid? 



186 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

" When round his head the aureole clings, 

And he is clothed in white, 
I'll take his hand and go with him 

To the deep wells of light; 
As unto a stream we will step down, 

And hathe there in God's sight. 

"We two will stand beside that shrine. 

Occult, withheld, untrod. 
Whose lamps are stirred continually 

With prayers sent up to God; 
And see our old prayers, granted, melt 

Each like a little cloud. 

" We two will lie in the shadow of 

That living mystic tree 
Within whose secret growth the Dove 

Is sometimes felt to be, 
While every leaf that his plumes touch 

Saith His Name audibly. 

"And I myself will teach to him, 

I myself, lying so, 
The songs I sing here; which his voice 

Shall pause in, hushed and slow. 
And find some knowledge at each pause. 

Or some new thing to know." . . . 

She gazed and listened and then said. 
Less sad of speech than mild, — 

"All this is when he comes." She ceased. 
The light thrilled through her, fill'd 

With angels in strong level flight. 

Her eyes prayed, and she smiled. . . . 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 187 



280 



I went to sleep ; and now I am refreshed, 

A strange refreshment: for I feel in me 

An inexpressible lightness, and a sense 

Of freedom, as I were at length myself, 

And ne'er had been before. How still it is! 

I hear no more the busy beat of time. 

No, nor my fluttering breath, nor struggling pulse; 

Nor does one moment differ from the next. . . . 

Another marvel: some one has me fast 

Within his ample palm; 'tis not a grasp 

Such as they use on earth, but all around 

Over the surface of my subtle being. 

As though I were a sphere and capable 

To be accosted thus, a uniform 

And gentle pressure tells me I am not 

Self-moving, but borne forward on my way. 

And hark! I hear a singing; yet in sooth 

I cannot of that music rightly say 

Whether I hear or touch or taste the tones. 

Oh what a heart-subduing melody! . . . 

Now know I surely that I am at length 

Out of the body: had I part with earth, 

I never could have drunk those accents in. 

And not have worshipped as a God that voice 

That was so musical; but now I am 

So whole of heart, so calm, so self-possessed, 

With such a full content, and with a sense 

So apprehensive and discriminate. 

As no temptation can intoxicate. 

Nor have I even terror at the thought 

That I am clasped by such a saintliness. 

John Henry Newman 



188 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

281 

. . . Bliss greater than any we can know here awaits 
us in heaven. Does not the course of nature point to this? 
What else is the meaning of the gradual increase of love 
on earth? What else is the meaning of old age, when 
the bodily powers die, while the love increases? What does 
that point to, but to a restoration of the body when mortal- 
ity is swallowed up of life? Is not that mortality of the 
body sent us mercifully by God, to teach us that our love 
is spiritual, and therefore will be able to express itself in 
any state of existence? to wean our hearts that we may 
learn to look for more perfect bliss in the perfect body? 
Do not these thoughts take away from all earthly bliss 
the poisoning thought, "all this must end"? Ay, end! 
but only end so gradually that we shall not miss it, and 
the less perfect union on earth shall be replaced in heaven 
by perfect and spiritual bliss and union, inconceivable be- 
cause perfect! 

Do I undervalue earthly bliss? No! I enhance it 
when I make it the sacrament of a higher union! Will 
not these thoughts give more exquisite delight, will it not 
tear off the thorn from every rose and sweeten every nectar 
cup to perfect security of blessedness, in this life, to feel 
that there is more in store for us — that all expressions 
of love here are but dim shadows of a union which shall 
be perfect, if we will but work here, so as to work out our 
salvation. 

Charles Kingsley 

282 

. . . After my arrival at Innsbruck I wandered alone by 
the gush of that wild and roaring river. Everything was 
still and solemn. Mighty shadows were moving silently 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 189 

across the valley, like so many giant spectres, as the sun 
went down behind the hills. The outlines of the mountains 
gradually blended in a sky which became by degrees as 
black as themselves, and I was left in the grandeur of 
darkness. I felt, as I generally do on such occasions, 
strongly the swift rush of time — on and on, bearing every- 
thing along with it into the Infinite; and here are we, for 
a moment, powerless nothings, but endued with powers of 
agony and thought which none but immortals feel. Then 
I went slowly back to Innsbruck, heard the hum of life 
again, saw the windows glittering with light, heard the 
drone of the church bells, and met the crowds coming 
away from vespers. It all seemed a dream. 

Frederick W. Robertson 

283 

Whatever is taught or told. 

However men moan and sigh, 
Love never shall grow cold, 

And life shall never die. 

Bayard Taylor 

284 

There is no Death! What seems so is transition; 

This life of mortal breath 
Is but a suburb of the life Elysian, 

Whose portal we call Death. 

She is not dead — the child of our affection — 

But gone unto that school 
Where she no longer needs our poor protection. 

And Christ himself doth rule. 



190 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, 

By guardian angels led, 
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, 

She lives, whom we call dead. . . . 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 



285 

True is it that Death's face seems stern and cold, 
When he is sent to summon those we love, 
But all God's angels come to us disguised; 
Sorrow and sickness, poverty and death. 
One after other lift their frowning masks. 
And we behold the seraph's face beneath, 
All radiant with the glory and the calm 
Of having looked upon the front of God. 
With every anguish of our earthly part 
The spirit's sight grows clearer; this was meant 
When Jesus touched the blind man's lids with clay. 
Life is the jailer. Death the angel sent 
To draw the unwilling bolts and set us free. 
He flings not ope the ivory gate of Rest — 
Only the fallen spirit knocks at that — 
But to benigner regions beckons us. 
To destinies of more rewarded toil. 

... O, if Death 
More near approaches, meditates, and clasps 
Even now some dearer, more reluctant hand, 
God, strengthen thou my faith, that I may see 
That 'tis thine angel who, with loving haste. 
Unto the service of the inner shrine 
Doth waken thy beloved with a kiss. 

James Russell Lowell 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 191 

286 

I pray you, for some little time to come, not to muse 
too much upon your brother, even though such musings 
should be untinged with gloom and should appear to make 
you happier. In the eternity where he now dwells, it has 
doubtless become of no importance to himself whether 
he died yesterday or a thousand years ago. He is already 
at home . . . more at home than ever he was in his 
mother's house. Then let us leave him there for the 
present; and if the shadows and images of this fleeting time 
should interpose between us and him, let us not seek to 
drive them away for they are sent of God. 

Nathaniel Hawthorne 



287 

I long for household voices gone, 
For vanished smiles I long. 

But God hath led my dear ones on, 
And He can do no wrong. 

I know not what the future hath 

Of marvel or surprise. 
Assured alone that life and death 

His mercy underlies. . . . 

And so beside the Silent Sea 

I wait the muffled oar; 
No harm from Him can come to me 

On ocean or on shore. 

r know not where. His islands lift 
Their fronded palms in air; 



192 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

I only know I cannot drift 

Beyond His love and care. . . . 

John Greenleaf Whittier 

288 

. . . Alas for him who never sees 
The stars shine through his cypress trees! 
Who, hopeless, lays his dead away, 
Nor looks to see the breaking day 
Across the mournful marbles play! 
Who hath not learned, in hours of faith, 

The truth to flesh and sense unknown. 
That Life is ever lord of Death, 

And Love can never lose its own! . . . 

John Greenleaf Whittier 

289 

This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign, 

Sails the unshadowed main, — 

The venturous bark that flings 
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings 
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings. 

And coral reefs lie bare. 
Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair. 

Its web of living gauze no more unfurl; 

Wrecked is the ship of pearl! 

And every chambered cell. 
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell, 
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell, 

Before thee lies revealed, — 
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed! 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 193 

Year after year beheld the silent toil 

That spread his lustrous coil; 

Still, as the spiral grew, 
He left the past year's dwelling for the new, 
Stole with soft step its shining archway through, 

Built up its idle door. 
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more. 

Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, 

Child of the wandering sea, 

Cast from her lap, forlorn! 
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born 
Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn! 

While on mine ear it rings, 
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that 
sings: — 

Build thee more stately mansions, my soul, 

As the swift seasons roll! 

Leave thy low-vaulted past! 
Let each new temple, nobler than the last. 
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, 

Till thou at length art free, 
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes 



290 

This world is simply the threshold of our vast life; the 
first stepping-stone from nonentity into the boundless ex- 
panse of possibility. It is the infant-school of the soul. 
The physical universe spread out before us, and the 
spiritual trials and mysteries of our discipline, are simply 



194 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

our primer, our grammar, our spelling dictionary, to tell 
us something of the language we are to use in our maturity. 

Starr King 

291 

I have thought much lately of the possibility of my leav- 
ing you all and going home. I am come to that stage 
of my pilgrimage that is within sight of the River of 
Death, and I feel that now I must have all in readiness 
day and night for the messenger of the King. I have had 
sometimes in my sleep strange perceptions of a vivid 
spiritual life near to and with Christ, and multitudes of 
holy ones, and the joy of it is like no other joy — it can- 
not be told in the language of the world. What I have 
then I know with absolute certainty, yet it is so unlike 
and above anything we conceive of in this world that it is 
difficult to put it into words. The inconceivable loveliness 
of Christ! It seems that about Him there is a sphere 
where the enthusiasm of love is the calm habit of the soul, 
that without words, without the necessity of demonstrations 
of affection, heart beats to heart, soul answers soul, we 
respond to the Infinite Love, and we feel his answer in us, 
and there is no need of words. All seemed to be busy 
coming and going on ministries of good, and passing each 
gave a thrill of joy to each as Jesus, the directing soul, the 
centre of all, " over all, in all and through all," was working 
his beautiful and merciful will to redeem and save. I 
was saying as I awoke: — 

" 'Tis joy enough, my all in all 

At thy dear feet to lie. 
Thou wilt not let me lower fall, 

And none can higher fly." 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 195 

This was but a glimpse; but it has left a strange sweet- 
ness in my mind. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe 



292 

We have the promises of God as thick as daisies in 
summer meadows, that death, which men most fear, shall 
be to us the most blessed of experiences, if we trust in 
him. Death is unclasping; joy, breaking out in the desert; 
the heart, come to its blossoming-time! Do we call it 
dying when the bud bursts into flower? 

As birds in the hour of transmigration feel the impulse 
of southern lands, and gladly spread their wings for the 
realm of light and bloom, so may we, in the death hour, 
feel the sweet solicitations of the life beyond, and joyfully 
soar from the chill and shadow of earth to fold our wings 
and sing in the summer of an eternal heaven! 

Henry Ward Beecher 

293 

... I sincerely hope that my father may yet recover 
his health, but at all events, tell him to remember to call 
upon and confide in our great and good and merciful 
Maker, who will not turn away from him in any extremity. 
. . . Say to him that if we could meet now it is doubtful 
whether it would not be more painful than pleasant; but 
that if it be his lot to go now, he will soon have a joyous 
meeting with the many loved ones gone before, and where 
the rest of us, through the help of God, hope ere long to 
join them. 

Abraham Lincoln 



196 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

294 

. . . She [Mrs. Garrison] is not dead, — she has gone 
before; but she has not gone away. Nearer than ever, this 
very hour she watches and ministers to those in whose lives 
she was so wrapped; to whose happiness she was so de- 
voted. Who thinks that loving heart could be happy if it 
were not allowed to minister to those she loved? How 
easy it is to fancy the welcome the old faces have given 
her! The honoured faces, the familiar faces, the old tones, 
that have carried her back to the pleasant years of health 
and strength and willing labour! How gladly she broke 
the bonds that hindered her activity ! There are more there 
than here. Very slight the change seemed to her. She 
has not left us, she has rejoined them. She has joined 
the old band that worked life-long for the true and good. 
The dear, familiar names, how freshly they come to our 
lips! We can see them bend over and lift her up to them, 
to a broader life! Faith is sight today. She works on a 
higher level; ministers to old ideas; guards those she 
went through life with so lovingly. Even in that higher 
work they watch for our coming also. Let the years yet 
spared us here be a warning to make ourselves fit for that 
companionship ! 

. . . Blessed be Thy name for the threescore overflowing 
years; for the sunny sky she was permitted finally to see, 
the hated name made immortal, the perilled life guarded 
by a nation's gratitude, for the capstone put on with shout- 
ing; that she was privileged to enter the promised land 
and rest in the triumph, with the family circle unbroken, 
all her loved about her! And blessed be Thy name. 
Father, that in due time, with gracious and tender loving- 
kindness. Thou didst break the bonds that hindered her 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 197 

true life, and take her to higher service in Thine im- 
mediate presence. 

Wendell Phillips 

295 

While I must say with the great apostle, " It doth not 
yet appear what we shall be," I hold as well to the faith 
that ... I shall pass out of one room in the many 
mansions into another, and what treasure in the heavens 
was mine here, will be mine there, while that which is to 
come will not seem so much another life as the ripeness 
and perfecting of this life that now is. 

Robert Collyer 

296 

. . . We are made to believe in [immortality]. There is 
no better evidence than that [this] belief accords with 
human nature. . . . When the reason is unable to prove 
our immortality, the heart asserts it on the evidence of its 
own imperishable love. 

James Freeman Clarke 

297 

The immortality of the soul must rest upon something as 
universal, as spiritual, as eternal as the soul itself. It 
cannot be trusted to the testimony of external history, or 
literary records, or bodily appearances; it must be founded 
in the spiritual consciousness, in the laws of the soul, in 
the essential merits of the hope, in its inextinguishable 
charm for humanity, and in the testimony which its fruits 
produce on those who live by its light. . . . 

Jesus, the calmest, sanest, purest, best of souls, the con- 
summate flower of humanity, affirmed our personal im- 



198 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

mortality with midoubting, unqualified certainty. I believe 
him, not . . . because he rose from the dead, but because 
he was all alive, immortal, living on principle and for ends 
that were eternal, from the Sermon on the Mount to the 
words from the cross. 

Henry W, Bellows 

298 

We have faith in human immortality. . . . The great 
essential to this belief is a sufficiently elevated estimate of 
human nature: no man will ever deny its immortality who 
has a deep impression of its capacity for so great a 
destiny. . . . 

In proportion as our nature rises in its nobleness, does 
it realize its immortality. As it retires from animal gross- 
ness, from selfish meanness, from pitable ignorance or 
sordid neglect — as it opens forth into its true intellectual 
and moral glory — do its doubts disperse, its affections 
aspire: the veil is lifted from the future, the darkness 
breaks away, and the spirit walks in dignity within the 
paradise of God's eternity. What a testimony this is to 
the great truth from which our hope and consolations 
flow! What an incitement to seek its bright and steady 
light by the culture of every holy faculty within us! The 
more we do the will of our Father, the more do we feel 
that this doctrine is indeed of him. Its affinities are with 
the loftiest parts of our nature, and in our trust in it, we 
ally ourselves with the choicest spirits of our race. 

James Martineau 

299 

He who died at Azan sends 
This to comfort all his friends: 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 199 

Faithful friends! It lies, I know, 
Pale and white and cold as snow; 
And ye say, " Abdalla's dead! " 
Weeping at his feet and head, 
I can see your falling tears, 
I can hear your sighs and prayers; 
Yet I smile and whisper this — 
" I am not the thing you kiss; 
Cease your tears, and let it lie; 
It was mine, it is not I." 

Sweet friends! What the women lave 

For its last bed of the grave. 

Is but a hut which I am quitting. 

Is a garment no more fitting, 

Is a cage from which, at last. 

Like a hawk my soul hath passed. 

Love the inmate, not the room — 

The wearer, not the garb — the plume 

Of the falcon, not the bars 

Which kept him from those splendid stars. 

Loving friends! Be wise and dry 
Straightway every weeping eye — 
What ye lift upon the bier 
Is not worth a wistful tear. 
'Tis an empty sea-shell — one 
Out of which the pearl is gone; 
The shell is broken, it lies there; 
The pearl, the soul, the all, is here. 
'Tis an earthern jar, whose lid 
Allah sealed, the while it hid 
That treasure of his treasury, 
A mind that loved him; let it lie! 



200 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Let the shard be earth's once more. 
Since the gold shines in his store. 

Allah glorious! Allah good! 
Now thy world is understood; 
Now the long, long wonder ends; 
Yet ye weep, my erring friends, 
While the man whom ye call dead, 
In unspoken bliss, instead. 
Lives and loves you; lost, 'tis true, 
By such light as shines on you; 
But in the light ye cannot see 
Of imfulfilled felicity — 
In enlarging paradise. 
Lives a life that never dies. 

Farewell, friends! Yet not farewell; 
Where I am, ye, too, shall dwell. 
I am gone before your face, 
A moment's time, a little space. 
When ye come where I have stepped 
Ye will wonder why ye wept; 
Ye will know, by wise love taught. 
That here is all, and there is naught. 
Weep awhile, if ye are fain — 
Sunshine still must follow rain; 
Only not at death — for death. 
Now I know, is that first breath 
Which our souls draw when we enter 
Life, which is of all life centre. 

Be ye certain all seems love, 
Viewed from Allah's throne above; 
Be ye stout of heart, and come 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 201 

Bravely onward to your home! 

La Allah ilia Allah! yea! 

Thou love divine! Thou love alway! 

He that died at Azan gave 

This to those who made his grave. 

Sir Edwin Arnold 

300 

And this is death: I understand it all. 

New being waits me; new perceptions must 

Be born in me before I plunge therein; 

Which last is Death's affair; and while I speak, 

Minute by minute he is filling me 

With power ; and while my foot is on the threshold 

Of boundless life — the doors unopened yet, 

All preparations not complete within — 

I turn new knowledge upon old events. . . . 

Robert Browning 

301 

Be comforted; . . . 
The face of Death is toward the Sun of Life, 
His shadow darkens earth: his truer name 
Is " Onward," no discordance in the roll 
And march of that Eternal Harmony 
Whereto the worlds beat time, tho' faintly heard 
Until the great Hereafter. Mourn in hope. 

Alfred Tennyson 

302 

. . . My end of breath 
Shall bear away my soul in being true! . . . 
No work begun shall ever pause for death! 



202 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Love will be helpful to me more and more 
r the coming course, the new path I must tread. . . . 

Robert Browning 

303 

. . . the energy of life may be 
Kept on after the grave, but not begim; 
And he who flagg'd not in the earthly strife. 
From strength to strength advancing — only he. 
His Soul well-knit, and all his battles won, 
Mounts, and that hardly, to eternal life. 

Matthew Arnold 

304 

What we, when face to face we see i^ 

The Father of our souls, shall be, '$ 

John tells us, doth not yet appear; * 
Ah! did he tell what we are here! 

A mind for thoughts to pass into, 
A heart for loves to travel through. 
Five senses to detect things near, 
Is this the whole that we are here? 

Rules baffle instincts — instincts rules. 
Wise men are bad — and good are fools. 
Facts evil — wishes vain appear. 
We cannot go, why are we here? 

O may we for assurance' sake, 
Some arbitrary judgment take. 
And wilfully pronounce it clear, 
For this or that 'tis we are here? 






THE GRAIL OF LIFE 203 

Or is it right, and will it do, 
To face the sad confusion through, 
And say — It doth not yet appear, 
What we shall be, what we are here. 

Ah yet, when all is thought and said. 
The heart still overrules the head; 
Still what we hope we must believe, 
And what is given us receive; 

Must still believe, for still we hope 
That in a world of larger scope. 
What here is faithfully begun 
Will be completed, not undone. 

My child, we still must think, when we 
That ampler life together see. 
Some true result will yet appear 
Of what we are, together, here. 

Arthur Hugh C lough 

305 

... A wanderer is man from his birth. 

He was born in a ship 

On the breast of the river of Time; . . . 

Vainly does each, as he glides, 

Fable and dream 

Of the lands which the river of Time 

Had left ere he woke on its breast. 

Or shall reach when his eyes have been closed. . . . 

[For] what was before us we know not. 

And we know not what shall succeed . . . 

[But] the width of the waters, the hush 






204 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Of the grey expanse where he floats, 

Freshening its current and spotted with foam 

As it draws to the Ocean, may strike 

Peace to thfe soul of the man on its breast — 

As the pale waste widens around him, 

As the banks fade dimmer away, 

As the stars come out, and the night-wind 

Brings up the stream 

Murmurs and scents of the infinite sea. 

Matthew Arnold 



306 

Sunset and evening star. 

And one clear call for me! 
And may there be no moaning at the bar, 

When I put out to sea. 

But such a tide as moving seems asleep. 

Too full for sound and foam, 
When that which drew from out the boundless deep 

Turns again home. 

Twilight and evening bell. 

And after that the dark! 
And may there be no sadness of farewell. 

When I embark; 

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place 

The flood may bear me far, 
I hope to see my pilot face to face 

When I have crost the bar. 

Alfred Tennyson 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 205 

307 

Methinks we do as fretful children do, 
Leaning their faces on the window pane 
To sigh the glass dim with their own breath's stain, 
And shut the sky and landscape from their view; 
And thus, alas! since God the maker drew 
A mystic separation 'twixt those twain — 
The life beyond us and our souls in pain — 
We miss the prospect which we are called unto 
By grief we are fools to use. Be still and strong, 
O man, my brother! hold thy sobbing breath. 
And keep thy soul's large window pure from wrong, 
That so, as life's appointment issueth. 
Thy vision may be clear to watch along 
The sunset consummation-lights of death. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning 

308 

. . . Death is the entrance into the great light. 

Victor Hugo 
309 

... If so, death would be like the arrival of a traveller 
at the top of a great mountain, whence he sees spread out 
before him the whole configuration of the country, of which 
till then he had had but passing glimpses. To be able to 
overlook one's own history, to divine its meaning in the 
general concert and in the divine plan, would be the 
beginning of eternal felicity. Till then we had sacrificed 
ourselves to the universal order, but then we should under- 
stand and appreciate the beauty of that order. We had 
toiled and laboured under the conductor of the orchestra; 
and we should find ourselves become surprised and de- 



206 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

lighted hearers. We had seen nothing but our own little 
path in the mist; and suddenly a marvellous panorama and 
boundless distances would open before our dazzled eyes. 
Why not? 

Henri Frederick Amiel 

Eudoxe: 

Your immortality is only apparent; it does not extend 
beyond the eternity of action; it does not imply the eternity 
of the person. Jesus does more good today than when he 
was an obscure Galilean; but he is no longer living. 

Theogtiste: 

He is still alive. His person exists; it has even en- 
larged. Man lives where he acts. This life is dearer 
to us than bodily life, since we willingly sacrifice the 
latter for the former. Mind, I am not speaking only of 
the life as conceived in opinion, in reputation, or in re- 
membrance. This life, in fact, is insufficient, it is apt 
to be too unjust. The more fortunate are those who may 
have escaped this opinion. Tamerlane is more celebrated 
than some unknown righteous man. Marcus Aurelius en- 
joys the reputation he has merited not because he was 
emperor, but because he has written his Meditations. True 
influence is hidden; not that definite historic opinion is 
on the whole very wrong, but it sins entirely too often. 
Some unnamed individual may have been greater than 
Alexander; some woman's heart, who had never uttered 
a word about her life, may have felt more profoundly than 
the most eloquent poet. I am speaking of life through in- 
fluence, or, as the mystics would say, of life in God. 
Human life, not its moral opposite, draws a tiny trail like 
the point of a compass in the bosom of the infinite. This 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 207 

arc of a circle drawn in God has no more an end than God 
has. It is in the memory of God that men dwell immortal. 

The opinion which absolute conscience has of him, the 
remembrance of him which it preserves, — this is the true 
life of the righteous, this is the eternal life. Conscience 
assures a limitation, an opposition of the ego and the non- 
ego, which is the very negation of the Infinite. What is 
eternal is the idea. 

After all, is our hope presumptuous? Is our demand 
self-seeking? No, certainly not. We do exact no recom- 
pense; we simply require to live, to know more, to learn 
the secret of the universe which we have so eagerly sought, 
the destiny of humanity which has stirred us so passion- 
ately. 

Ernest Renan 

311 

It is not too much to say that in this point of view 
intelligence proves itself to belong essentially to an order 
of things which is superior to change and death, and which 
in its immortal stillness is unaffected and unperturbed by 
the fluctuations and evanescence that condition all finite 
things. 

A future of illimitable knowledge and goodness is pos- 
sible to it [the nature of man], because by its very structure 
it has power to realize itself in all that seems to limit it. 

John Caird 

312 

. . . We doubt whether any one of these views which 
regard human beings as altogether dependent and transi- 
tory has ever become a really pervading sentiment of the 
whole nature, in spontaneous thought and action, as well 
as in reflection. When an ancient poet, having scouted 



208 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

all idea of deities and retribution after death as useless 
terrors by which the smooth and peaceful course of our 
natural pleasure in life is disturbed, turns upon us and 
inveighs against the fear of death, and asks. Do we, in- 
satiable, desire to go on feasting for ever, and never to 
retire with dignity, as satisfied guests, from the banquet 
of life? the effect produced is no doubt striking. But 
in asking this does he not forget that monitions to modera- 
tion and dignity must fall very flat on the ear of him who 
knows that in an hour he will cease to be? Or, in using 
this simile, which is quite out of keeping with his general 
tenor, is he not perchance secretly influenced by the truer 
thought that this life is indeed a banquet, from which 
as guests who have had enough, we must depart; but 
that we, not so transitory, depart from it only to enter 
another state of existence in which there will remain to 
us the memory of what we have before enjoyed? And, on 
the other side, what poetic and glowing expression has of- 
ten been given to pantheistic views! But whilst they 
extol with devotional rapture the absorption of the indi- 
vidual in the universal, is not that which they are glorifying 
just the abiding and enduring joy, which the mortal ex- 
periences in its reunion with the eternal? And do they 
not hereby assert the immortality of that mortal, which, 
though destined to extinction, is only destined to such an 
extinction as signifies its eternal preservation in some 
form or other? This thought, which pantheistic poetry 
cannot escape, is one which cannot be got rid of either by 
the most prosaic reasoning or the most commonplace views. 
People may seem to be as thoroughly convinced as you will 
of their own impending annihilation, and may speak of the 
disappearance of personal existence in the lap of universal 
Nature, and one may indeed imagine that that which used to 
happen may cease to happen, but one can never imagine that 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 209 

anything which has once existed can cease to be. And how- 
ever much people may attempt to persuade themselves that 
the self-conscious Ego is in fact only an event, a vanish- 
ing passage between atoms variously moved, still the imme- 
diate consciousness of our own personal reality will always 
remain invincible to these attempts, and we can never think 
of ourselves as melting away in the great receptacle of 
universal Nature without thinking too that we shall still 
be preserved and go on existing in it in our dissolved con- 
dition. 

. . . Although in theory, men would have often denied 
the existence of this inextinguishable feeling of being 
bound up with an imperishable world, yet its activity has 
been shown again and again. Sometimes in the provident 
care for the wellbeing of a distant posterity — a care 
which seems to spring up spontaneously in men's hearts; 
sometimes in the intense interest taken in the general 
improvement of mankind; and how often in outbursts of 
ambition which have disturbed the world! 

The individual soul that considers itself to be a mere 
passing production of Nature is seldom altogether in- 
different to future fame, and yet in what would the attrac- 
tion of such fame consist if it were merely attached to a 
name which no longer had an owner! In all these mani- 
festations there is revealed the suppressed belief in a world 
of spiritual interests, a world to which its individual 
members are indissolubly united, far as we may yet be 
from any clear idea of the way in which what seems so 
transient becomes endowed with eternal existence. 

Herman Lotze 

313 

Death [is] a transitory stage in a life that does not 
find completion in this world. Our ultimate reason for 



210 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

believing anything that goes beyond our immediate sen- 
sible experience, is that we cannot give a rational account 
of the facts, cannot conceive them as part of an intelligible 
order, if it be not true. And on this ground I think there 
is strong evidence for man's future existence. The whole 
system of things, of which man is the highest part, can 
be made coherent with itself only on the view that his 
earthly life is a part of a greater whole. This is the only 
view that is consistent with the conviction that the universe 
is a rational, and therefore a moral, system; or, what is 
the same thing, with the existence of a God who governs 
the world. Now this means that we should believe in a 
future life because we have good ground to believe in God 
and in goodness as the ultimate principle of all things. 

Edward Caird 

314 

The same wide consent of mankind which sustains belief 
in a God, and invests Him with a certain character, has 
everywhere perceptibly, though variably and sometimes 
with a great vagueness of outline, carried the sphere of the 
moral government which it assigns to Him beyond the limits 
of the visible world. In that larger region, though it lie 
beyond the scope of our present narrow view, the belief of 
theistical mankind has been, that the laws of this moral 
government would be more clearly developed, and the 
normal relation between good and evil, and between their 
respective consequences, fully established. 

Along, therefore, with a belief in God, we have to register 
the acknowledgement of another truth, the doctrine of tlie 
future state of man, which has had a not less ample ac- 
ceptance in all the quarters from which the elements of 
authority can be drawn; and has, indeed, in the darkest 
periods and places of religion, been found difficult to eradi- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 211 

cate, even when the Divine Idea had been so broken up 
and degraded, as to seem divested of all its most splendid 
attributes. 

William E. Gladstone 



315 

... To any one who feels it conducive either to his 
satisfaction or to his usefulness to hope for a future state, 
. . . there is no hindrance to his indulging that hope. 
Appearances point to the existence of a Being who has 
great power over us . . . and of whose goodness we have 
evidence . . . and as we do not know the limits either of 
his power or of his goodness, there is room to hope that 
both the one and the other may extend to granting us this 
gift. . . . The same ground which permits the hope, war- 
rants us in expecting that if there be a future life, it will 
be at least as good as the present, and will not be wanting 
in the best feature of the present life, improvability by our 
own efforts. . . . 

John Stuart Mill 



316 

With respect to immortality, nothing shows me (so 
clearly) how strong and almost instinctive a belief it is, 
as the consideration of the view now held by most physicists, 
namely that the sun with all the planets will in time grow 
too cold for life. . . . Believing as I do that man in the 
distant future will be a far more perfect creature than 
he now is, it is an intolerable thought that he and all other 
sentient beings are doomed to complete annihilation after 
such long-continued slow process. . . . 

Charles Darwin 



212 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

317 

All nature tells us the same strange, mysterious story, of 
the exuberance of life, of endless variety, of unimaginable 
quantity. All this life upon our earth has led up to and 
culminated in that of man. It has been, I believe, a com- 
mon and not unpopular idea that during the whole process 
of the rise and growth and extinction of past forms, the 
earth has been preparing for the ultimate — Man. Much of 
the wealth and luxuriance of living things, the infinite variety 
of form and structure, the exquisite grace and beauty in bird 
and insect, in foliage and flower, may have been mere by- 
products of the grand mechanism we call nature — the one 
and only method of developing humanity. 

And is it not in perfect harmony with this grandeur 
of design (if it be design), this vastness of scale, this 
marvellous process of development through all the ages, 
that the material universe needed to produce this cradle 
of organic life, and of a being destined to a higher and 
a permanent existence, should be on a corresponding scale 
of vastness, of complexity, of beauty? Even if there were 
no such evidence as I have here adduced for the unique 
position and the exceptional characteristics which distin- 
guish the earth, the old idea that all the planets were in- 
habited, and that all the stars existed for the sake of other 
planets, which planets existed to develop life, would, in the 
light of our present knowledge, seem utterly improbable 
and incredible. It would introduce monotony into a uni- 
verse whose grand character and teaching is endless diver- 
sity. It would imply that to produce the living soul in the 
marvellous and glorious body of man — man with his 
faculties, his aspirations, his powers for good and evil — 
that this was an easy matter which could be brought about 
anywhere, in any world. It would imply that man is an 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 213 

animal and nothing more, is of no importance in the uni- 
verse, needed no great preparations for his advent, only, 
perhaps, a second-rate demon, and a third or fourth-rate 
earth. Looking at the long and slow and complex growth 
of nature that preceded his appearance, the immensity 
of the stellar universe with its thousand million suns, and 
the vast aeons of time during which it has been develop- 
ing — all these seem only the appropriate and harmonious 
surroundings, the necessary supply of material, the sufl&- 
ciently spacious workshop for the production of that planet 
which was to produce, first, the organic world, and then, 
Man. . . . 

Man is a duality, consisting of an organized spiritual 
form, evolved coincidently with and permeating the physical 
body, and having corresponding organs and development. 
Death is the separation of this duality, and effects no 
change in the spirit, morally or intellectually. Progres- 
sive evolution of the intellectual and moral nature is the 
destiny of individuals; the knowledge, attainments, and 
experience of earth-life forming the basis of spirit-life. 

Alfred Russel Wallace 

318 

. . . From the first dawning of life, we see all things 
working together toward one mighty goal, the evolution 
of the most exalted spiritual qualities which characterize 
Humanity. The body is cast aside and returns to the dust 
of which it was made. The earth, so marvellously wrought 
to man's uses, will also be cast aside. The day is to come, 
no doubt, when the heavens shall vanish as a scroll, and 
the elements be melted with fervent heat. So small is the 
value which Nature sets upon the perishable forms of 
matter! The question, then, is reduced to this: are Man's 



214 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

highest spiritual qualities, into the production of which 
all this creative energy has gone, to disappear with the 
rest? Has all this work been done for nothing? Is it all 
ephemeral, all a bubble that bursts, a vision that fades? 
Are we to regard the Creator's work as like that of a child, 
who builds houses out of blocks, just for the pleasure of 
knocking them down? For aught that science can tell us, 
it may be so, but I can see no good reason for believing 
any such thing. . . . The more thoroughly we comprehend 
that process of evolution by which things have come to be 
what they are, the more we are likely to feel that to deny 
the everlasting persistence of the spiritual element in Man 
is to rob the whole process of its meaning. It goes far 
toward putting us to permanent intellectual confusion, and 
I do not see that any one has as yet alleged, or is ever 
likely to allege, a sufficient reason for our accepting so 
dire an alternative. 

For my own part, therefore, I believe in the immortality 
of the soul, not in the sense in which I accept the demon- 
strable truths of science, but as a supreme act of faith 
in the reasonableness of God's work. . . . Such a crown of 
wonder seems to me no more than the fit climax to a crea- 
tive work that has been ineffably beautiful and marvellous 
in all its myriad stages. . . . 

John Fiske 

319 

Nature, through the whole geological history of the earth, 
was gestative mother of spirit, which, after its long 
embryonic development, came to birth and independent 
life and immortality in man. ... As the material evolu- 
tion of Nature found its goal, its completion, and its signifi- 
cance in man, so must man enter immediately upon a higher 
spiritual evolution to find its goal and completion and signi- 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 215 

ficance in the ideal man — the Divine man. As spirit, un- 
conscious in the womb of Nature, continues to develop by 
necessary law until it comes to birth and independent life 
in man, so the new-born spirit of man . . . must ever strive 
by freer law to attain, through a newer birth, unto a higher 
life. ... Is there any conceivable meaning in Nature with- 
out this consummation? All evolution has its beginning, 
its course, its end. Without immortality this beautiful 
cosmos, which has been developing into increasing beauty 
for so many millions of years, when its evolution has run 
its course and all is over, would be precisely as if it had 
never been — an idle dream, an idiot tale signifying noth- 
ing. I repeat, without immortality, the cosmos has no 
meaning. 

Joseph Le Conte 

320 

The great significance of the individual man fairly raises 
the presumption that his place in Nature has a meaning 
that is not to be measured by the length of his life in the 
body. Looking as we must do for a purpose that justifies 
to our understanding all this doing of Nature, is it not 
reasonable to suppose that one at least of the designed re- 
sults is attained in the creation of these historic personal- 
ities? May we not fairly regard these persons as contain- 
ing and preserving the permanent gain which comes from 
the work of the visible universe: as the indestructible profit 
of a work which otherwise would offend us by its apparent 
resultlessness? . . . 

Nathaniel Shaler 

321 

Out of the dusk a shadow, 
Then, a spark; 



216 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Out of. the cloud a silence, 

Then, a lark; 
Out of the heart a rapture, 

Then, a pain; 
Out of the dead, cold ashes. 

Life again. 

John B. Tabb 

322 

. . . Out of death comes the view of the life beyond the 
grave. . . . Though death be repugnant to the flesh, yet 
where the Spirit is given, to die is gain. What a wonderful 
transition it is! 

Michael Faraday 

323 

... Death, . . . 

Opener and usher to the heavenly mansion. . . . 

Walt Whitman 

324 

The word of summons comes and the soul leaps to answer 
it. The eternal life in us answers to the eternal life beyond 
the grave, recognizes it, flees to its own. There is no 
violence of transfer. It is a continuation of the one same 
life. The grave is only the moat around the inner castle 
of the King, across which they who have long been His 
loving and loyal retainers on the farther side enter in, sure 
of a welcome to the heart of His hospitality. Far above 
any morbid or affected, unnatural, unhuman pretence of a 
wish for death there towers this calm Christian confidence, 
ready to die, yet glad to stay here until the time comes; 
knowing that death will be release, and yet finding life 
happy and rich with the power of the resurrection already 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 217 

present in it; counting both worlds God's worlds, and so 
neither despising this nor dreading the other. . . . 

Phillips Brooks 

325 

... What then is the meaning of life? ... To me it 
seems intelligible only as the avenue and vestibule to an- 
other life. Its facts seem explainable only upon a theory 
which cannot be expressed but in myth and symbol, and 
which, everywhere and at all times, the myths and symbols 
in which men have tried to portray their deepest perceptions, 
do in some form express. . . . Shall we say that what 
passes from our sight passes into oblivion? No; not into 
oblivion. Far, far beyond our ken the eternal laws must 
hold their sway. The hope that rises is the heart of all re- 
ligions! The poets have sung it, the seers have told it, 
and in its deepest pulses the heart of man throbs responsive 
to its truth. 

Henry George 

326 

Much on earth is hidden from us, but there is given us 
in recompense the secret conviction of our living bond with 
another world, a celestial and loftier world: and the very 
roots of our thoughts and sensations are not here but there 
in other worlds. 

Dostoevsky 

327 

I believe in the life eternal; and I believe that man 
is rewarded according to his acts, here and everywhere, 
now and forever. I believe that so firmly that, at my 
age, seeing myself upon the edge of the grave, I must 



218 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

often make an eflfort not to pray for the death of my body; 
that is to say, for my birth into a new life. . . . 

Leo Tolstoi 

328 

On the question before us [immortality] wide and far 
your hearts will range from those early days when matins 
and evensong, evensong and matins sang the larger hope 
of humanity into your souls. . . . You will wander through 
all phases, to come at last, I trust, to the opinion of Cicero, 
who had rather be mistaken with Plato than be in the right 
with those who deny altogether the life after death; and 
this is my own confessio fidei. 

Sir William Osier 

329 

I'm always speculating about why I always take Life 
after Death for granted, while so many people start with 
extinction, and throw the onus prohandi of a hereafter on 
the Immortalist. I always catch myself seeking for a proof 
of extinction, and finding Aone. I used to think once that 
it was only resentment against the attitude of those who 
see a proof of cessation of existence in the disappearance 
of the means by which they have detected it in others. . . . 
For I have never seen, and never shall see, that the cessation 
of the evidence of existence is necessarily evidence of the 
cessation of existence. . . . 

. . . the death of a man might be better described as the 
birth of a soul, and, inferentially, a parallel between the 
foresight into its life to come of the unborn child on the 
one hand and the unborn soul on the other. Who shall 
say that the unborn child in its degree does not learn as 
much of this world as we succeed in learning of the 
next? . . . 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 219 

The end of Life is beyond its powers of knowledge. 
Death is a change that occurs at its beginning. The high- 
est good is the growth of the Soul, and the greatest man 
is he who rejoices most in great fulfilments of the will of 
God. 

William De Morgan 

330 

This is not the place to enter into detail or to discuss 
facts scorned by orthodox science, but I cannot help re- 
membering that an utterance from this chair is no ephemeral 
production, for it remains to be criticized by generations 
yet imborn, whose knowledge must inevitably be fuller and 
wider than our own. Your President therefore should not 
be completely bound by the shackles of present-day ortho- 
doxy, nor limited to beliefs fashionable at the time. In 
justice to myself and my co-workers I must risk annoy- 
ing my present hearers, not only by leaving on record my 
conviction that occurrences now regarded as occult can be 
examined and reduced to order by the methods of science 
carefully and persistently applied, but by going further 
and saying, with the utmost brevity, that already the facts 
so examined have convinced me that memory and affection 
are not limited to that association with matter by which 
alone they can manifest themselves here and now, and 
that personality persists beyond bodily death. 

Sir Oliver Lodge 

331 

V mystery of Life, 

That after all our strife, 
Defeats, mistakes, 



220 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Just as, at last, we see 
The road to victory. 
The tired heart breaks. 

^ Just as the long years give 
Knov/ledge of how to live, 

Life's end draws near; 
As if, that gift being ours, 
God needed our new powers 

In worlds elsewhere. 

There, if the Soul whose wings 
Were won in suffering, springs 

To life anew. 
Justice would have some room 
For hope beyond the tomb, 

And mercy, too. 

J And since, without this dream 
No light, no faintest gleam 

Answers our " why " ; 
But earth and all its race 
Must pass and leave no trace 

On that blind sky; 

Shall reason close that door 
On all we struggled for. 

Seal the Soul's doom; 
Make all this universe 
One wild answering curse. 

One lampless tomb? 

4 Mine be the dream, the creed 
That leaves for God, indeed. 
For God, and man. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 221 

One open door whereby 
To prove His world no lie 
And crown his plan. 

Alfred Noyes 

332 

Thou Power, that beyond the wind 

Rulest, to thee I am resigned. 

My child from me is snatched away; 

She vanished at the peer of day. 

Yet I discern with clearer brow 

A high indulgence in the blow, 

Light in the storm that o'er me broke, 

A special kindness in the stroke, 

A gentleness behind the Law, 

A sweetness following on the awe. 

Shall I forget that noon-day hour. 

When as upon some favourite flower 

A deep and tingling bliss was shed, 

A thrilling peace from overhead? 

I had not known it since my birth, 

I shall not know it more on earth. 

But now I may not sin, nor err. 

For fear of ever losing her. 

Though reeling from Thy thunder blow. 

Though blinded with Thy lightning low, 

I stagger back to dismal life, 

And mix myself with mortal strife. 

Thy judgment still to me is sweet; 

I feel, I feel, that we shall meet. 

Stephen Phillips 



222 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

333 

We know not where they tarry who have died; 
The gate wherein they entered is made fast, 
No living mortal hath seen one who past 
Hither, from out the darknes deep and wide. 

We lean on Faith ; and some less wise have cried : 
"Behold the butterfly, the seed that's cast! " 
Vain hopes that fall like flowers before the blast! 
What man can look on Death un terrified? — 

Who love can never die! They are part 
Of all that lives beneath the summer sky; 
With the world's living soul their souls are one; 

Nor shall they in vast nature be undone 

And lost in the general life. Each separate heart 
Shall live, and find its own, and never die. 

Richard Watson Gilder 



334 

We know not how it is to be, or where. But somehow, 
somewhere, whether we wish for it or not, we know, by the 
dumb craving of the ordered world, as well as by the ut- 
tered hope of holiest souls, that God will yet fulfill us 
into something better than the fragments that we are. And 
so we wait, and work, and watch, and do the best we m^ay, 
or bow our heads in sorrow that our doing is so much below 
the best — and as his laws ordain we let life go, or fall 
asleep, but always for some further greater life beyond the 
shadows and the sleeping. 

Brooke Herford 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



223 



335 

The belief in a future life is a natural and an universal 
one. It may claim the credit of being native and essential, 
unless it can be disproved. It cannot be disproved. The 
most that doubt can do is to say that it does not know. 
It may stand, then; and no one may justly charge it with 
unreason. Beyond this there are many indications that 
point toward this belief as their most rational solution. 
This hypothesis of a future is the one which most naturally 
accounts for all known facts. Such being the case, we may 
as logically claim it as the astronomer claims a new planet, 
as yet unseen, as the needed explanation of the perturba- 
tions and movements that ask for some such cause. 

Minot J. Savage 

336 

. . . We rejoice that in the hours of our purer vision, 
when the pulse-throb of eternity is strong within us, we 
know that no pang of mortality can reach our unconquer- 
able soul, and that . . . death is but the gateway to life 
eternal. . . . 

Walter Rauschenbusch 



337 

It must never be forgotten that humanity is involved in 
this faith, that humanity is its witness. ... It persists 
in believing that the universe is reasonable, and that human 
life in its best achievement, in its best capacity, and in its en- 
during moral need, is of permanent concern to the Most 
High. . . . Through the higher instincts not of one man, 
but of all men; through the kinship to the Infinite, not of 
single lives, but of all lives; through the ideals that dawn, 



224 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

not upon a few favoured individuals, but upon mankind; 
finally, through the great note of permanence in the soul, 
the universe would seem to be delivering its decree concern- 
ing the dignity and destiny of the race. ... It is this 
voice that the prophet of today waits to hear, the voice 
like the sound of many waters and mighty thunderings, 
rolling through all the deeper and greater humanities, the 
voice of the Infinite speaking through the race, at length 
become harmonious with his righteous purpose in history, 
and registering his decree in favour of the immortality of 
man. 

George A. Gordon 

338 

Immortality is one of the great spiritual needs of man. 
... I have to confess that my own personal feeling . . . 
has never been of the keenest order, and that, among the 
problems that give my mind solicitude, this one does not 
take the very foremost place. Yet there are individuals 
with a real passion for the matter, men and women for 
whom a life hereafter is a pungent craving . . . and in 
whom keenness of interest has bred an insight into the 
relations of the subject that no one less penetrated with the 
mystery of it can attain. Some of these persons are known 
to me . . . they do not speak as the scribes, but as having 
direct authority. . . . 

In strict logic . . . the fangs of cerebralistic materialism 
are drawn. My words ought to exert a releasing function 
on your hopes. You may believe henceforward, whether 
you care to profit by the permission or not. . . . 

The reader would be in accord with everything that the 
text of my lecture intended to say, were he to assert that 
every memory and afifection of his present life is to be 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 225 

preserved, and that he shall never in saecula saeculorum 
cease to be able to say to himself: " I am the same per- 
sonal being who in old times upon the earth had those ex- 
periences." 

William James 

339 

I have never seen what to me seemed an atom of proof 
that there is a future life. And yet^I am strongly in- 
clined to expect one. 

Mark Twain 

340 

. . . That there is a great will at work behind it all, I 
cannot for a moment doubt; nor can I doubt that I do 
it, with many foolish fears and delays, and shall do it to 
the end. Why it is that, voyaging thus to the haven be- 
neath the hill, I meet such adverse breezes, such head- 
strong currents, such a wTack of wind and thwarting wave, 
I know not; nor what that other land will be like, if in- 
deed I sail beyond the sunset; but that a home awaits me 
and all mankind I believe, of which this quiet house, so 
pleasantly ordered, among its old trees and dewy pastures, 
is but a faint sweet symbol. . . . There is a Truth behind 
all confusions and errors; a good beyond all pilgrimages. 
I shall find it, I shall reach it, in some day of sudden glory, 
of hope fulfilled and sorrow ended; and no step of the 
way thither will be wasted, whether trodden in despair and 
weariness or in elation and delight, till we have learned not 
to fear, not to judge, not to mistrust, not to despise; till 
in a moment our eyes will be opened, and we shall know 
that we have found peace. 

Arthur Christopher Benson 



226 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

341 

. . . Among all the possibilities which the universe still 
hides from us, one of the easiest to realize, one of the most 
probable ... is certainly the possibility of enjoying an 
existence much more spacious, lofty, perfect, durable and 
secure than that which is offered to us by our actual con- 
sciousness. Admitting this possibility — and there are few 
as probable — the problem of immortality is, in principle, 
solved. It now becomes a question of grasping or fore- 
seeing its ways and, amid the circumstances that interest 
us the most, of knowing what part of our intellectual and 
moral acquirements will pass into our eternal and uni- 
versal life. . . . 

Maurice Maeterlinck 

342 

Our own will dies and God's will lives in us, and in so 
far as this is the case we attain the object of oiir earthly 
existence, that is, the realization of a higher and wider con- 
sciousness, the discovery of our true personality, which is 
immortal. This cannot persist until it has been attained, 
and its attainment is the Way of Life. In other words, 
when we are conscious of the Divine life and love dwelling 
within us, our human life becomes a conscious partaker of 
the endless life of God. 

Sir William F. Barrett 

343 

As to the soul, verily it is sent forth by the Word of 
God, and it is that which, when kindled by the Fire of the 
Love of God, will not be quenched, neither by the waters 
of the rain, nor by the seas of the world. It is indeed that 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 227 

kindled fire which is burning in the human Lote-tree, 
uttering " Verily there is no God but HE," and he who 
hears His voice is one of those who are successful. On 
leaving the body, God will send it forth after the best 
form, and cause it to enter into a high heaven: verily 
thy Lord is powerful over all things. 

Baha O'Llah 

344 

. . . The Infinite Power of Love that has grounded a 
new spontaneous nature in man over against a dark and 
hostile world, will conserve such a new nature and its 
spiritual nucleus, and shelter it against all perils and as- 
saults, so that life as the bearer of Life Eternal can never 
be wholly lost in the stream of time. Thus we obtain 
. . . belief in immortality — conviction of the indestructi- 
bility of that spiritual unity of life in man, which is the 
work of God. And it is from such a conception that the 
conviction of the eternity of the Divine Life proceeds — 
a conviction which gives man a trust in the preservation 
in some kind of way of the spiritual nucleus of his na- 
ture. . . . 

Rudolph Eucken 

345 

I build my belief in immortality on the conviction that 
the fundamental reality of the universe is consciousness, and 
that no consciousness can ever be extinguished, for it be- 
longs to the whole and must be fulfilled in the whole. The 
one unthinkable supposition from this point of view is 
that any kind of being which has ever become aware of it- 
self, that is, has ever contained a ray of the eternal con- 
sciousness, can perish. 

Reginald G. Campbell 



228 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

346 

In the will, as in consciousness, we have a new element 
in the evolution of the life, the development of a force 
which can dominate brain processes. It is an autonomy, 
controlling the nervous system, and regulating the func- 
tions of the mind. It is a psychic force which from its 
place of authority can direct the stores of nerve force, now 
into this channel and now into that, by a power of choice 
which has no physiological law, and, indeed, no psycho- 
logical law can explain or predict. 

The body thus appears to have produced what it can no 
longer control, nor even understand; and evolution has 
brought forth the flower and glory of its age-long develop- 
ment. 

Beyond this stage of mental evolution it is not neces- 
sary to go because we have now crossed the great gulf 
between the physiological and the psychical, and have set 
our feet firmly on that shore where the higher faculties of 
the mind, reason and abstract thought, are subsequently 
developed. These higher powers serve only to point us 
still further along the road that delivers us from bondage 
to the flesh, and leads us to anticipate the complete emanci- 
pation of the mind from the body. The mind may hence- 
forth become indifferent to the disasters which in the 
course of nature are bound to overtake the body, and may 
hope to survive its destruction and decay — and perhaps 
thereafter to find or create for itself a " spiritual body " 
adapted to a different sphere of existence and to other modes 
of life. . . . 

. . . For the present, so far as science is concerned, life 
after the grave is not a proved fact, but the evidence is 
sufl&cient to justify faith in it. Such " faith " is often looked 
upon as a specifically religious function, and suggests to 



I 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 229 

the casual observer a process of " swallowing " what is in- 
credible. Far from that being the case, faith is a func- 
tion which the scientist employs constantly and without 
which he could not conduct his investigations. " Faith " 
is merely the religious counterpart of the " hypothesis " 
of the scientist. He is bound to assume as a hypothesis 
the law of gravity, and other mighty assumptions which 
he has not proved ; but, having assumed any such hypothesis, 
he finds that the facts of the universe as he knows them 
fit so perfectly into it that he is confirmed in his belief 
in the legitimacy of his hypothesis. Precisely the same 
process is employed by the religious man who assumes the 
truth of belief in God and in immortal life. Having ac- 
cepted these hypotheses, he finds that they explain so mfiny 
of the deep problems of the world that his faith in them is 
confirmed. Since, therefore, the facts of science, which 
we have been studying, seem rather to confirm than to con- 
tradict the hypothesis of a life beyond death, the religious 
man is acting only reasonably when he accepts the belief 
as an article of faith. ... 

James Arthur Had field 

347 

The notion of a material identity between the present 
and future bodies is one which ought to be far more em- 
phatically repudiated by the Church than has hitherto been 
done; but that does not mean that there is no connection 
or continuity between them. That connection, however, 
clearly cannot consist in identity of material particles; 
for even in this life, so we are told, the material particles 
which constitute our bodies are completely replaced about 
once in every seven years. The principle of continuity 
and connection between my body of today and my body 



230 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

of twenty years ago is to be found, not in its material 
particles, but in the form-giving body-building principle 
of life within, i. e., in the soul. The soul is not, as the 
Gnostics thought, a mere prisoner in a body of alien na- 
ture. Body affects soul and soul affects body, and neither 
is complete without the other; but (as argued above), the 
soul is the " predominant partner." But if the principle 
of bodily continuity even in this world is found not in 
any identity of material particles, but in the soul, it 
is obvious that the principle of continuity between the 
terrestrial and the celestial body also must be looked for 
in the same direction. And if we ask how the connection 
we seek can be adequately supplied by the soul, the reply 
would be that it is in virtue of that power inherent in the 
life principle of determining form and of building up by 
assimilation from its environment a new body suited to that 
environment — whether that environment be in this world or 
in the world beyond our sight. 

Burnett Hillman Streeter 

348 i 

The life eternal is the life we are living now and here. 
[But] the individual as we know him on this earth can- 
not reappear in another world. . . . What the father, 
mother, friend we have touched " here below " is, he or 
she is by the co-operating force of both mind and body. 
But, if the mind be the creator of the body, it can pass on 
in another stage of existence to create for itself a better 
body to realize the aspirations felt but unattainable here. 
Soul may know soul hereafter through all their new clothes. 

Henry D, Lloyd 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 231 

349 

[We] belong not to this world of our merely human 
sense and thought. . . . Therein lies the very proof that 
[we] even now belong to a higher and to a richer realm. 
Therein lies the very sign of [our] true immortality. 

Despite God's absolute unity, we, as individuals, pre- 
serve and attain our unique lives and meanings, and are 
not lost in the very life that sustains us, and that needs us 
as its own expression. This life is real through us all; 
and we are real through our union with that life. Close is 
our touch with the eternal. Boundless is the meaning of 
our nature. Its mysteries baffle our present science, and 
escape our present experience; but they need not blind our 
eyes to the central unity of Being, nor make us feel lost 
in a realm where all the wanderings of time mean the 
process whereby is discovered the homeland of Eternity. 

Josiah Royce 

350 

Personality, being the highest product and final crown 
of life and of the universe, must be permanent, or all 
value vanishes with it. Its permanence is seen in its per- 
sistence through all earthly vicissitudes. While it de- 
velops from germinal consciousness to fullblown power, 
yet after emerging into selfhood it retains its central core 
of consciousness, which does not change with the years but 
remains as the identical self. Its outward circumstances 
are in a state of ceaseless flux and at times pass through 
tremendous shocks and upheavals; its very body flows 
away from it in a steady stream and is constantly replaced 
with new tissues; its subjective experience is in a state of 
incessant change and development, and at intervals en- 
counters catastrophic crises and is swept by terrible storms; 



232 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

and yet none of these things rolls it from its base, but its 
central self persists as the same personality. If it can sur- 
vive such constant and deep changes and even repeatedly 
put off the entire body and clothe itself in a new garment 
of the flesh, will it not survive the still greater shock of 
death and weave around itself a new body adapted to its 
new condition? ... 

The end of each stage of evolution marks a critical point 
where the product is cut off from the process and raised 
to a higher level. The direction in which this principle 
points is plain: it points to a higher life for man. His 
soul ripens on the stem of the body and then is detached 
and the body perishes. But the whole analogy of evolution 
requires that this most precious product should not be lost, 
but should pass on to a higher stage and be devoted to a 
more exalted use, or be transmuted into finer, richer life. 
The long, slow, unwearied climb, purchased at every step 
by a great deal of sacrifice, from the ether to the atom, 
from the atom to the crystal, from the crystal to the cell, and 
from the cell to man, has been struggling towards personal- 
ity as its goal. Shall the atom and the crystal and the cell 
be on their way to a higher destiny at the lower end of the 
scale of evolution, and yet personality in the human soul at 
the top fail of this principle and hope and fall into nothing- 
ness? . . . That personalities, the highest and costliest em- 
bodiments of worth, should be produced through the travail 
of divine birth only to be flung as rubbish to the void, puts 
to confusion all our ideas of reason and right. Evolution 
itself has written all over it the promise and potency of 
some better thing, and its long, blood-stained process is ade- 
quately completed and crowned only when the human soul, 
its topmost blossom and finest fruit, passes into a higher 
world and an immortal life. 

James H. Snowden 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 233 

351 

The law of evolution is that Good shall on the whole 
increase in the universe with the process of the suns: that 
immortality itself is a special case of a more general 
Law, namely, that in the whole universe nothing really 
finally perishes that is worth keeping, that a thing once 
attained is not thrown away. 

The general mutability and mortality in the world need 
not disturb us. The things we see perishing and dying are 
not of the same kind as those which we hope will endure. 
Death and decay, as we know them, are interesting physical 
processes, which may be studied and understood; they have 
seized the imagination of man, and govern his emotions, 
perhaps unduly, but there is nothing in them to suggest 
ultimate destruction, or the final triumph of ill; they are 
necessary correlatives to conception and birth into a ma- 
terial world; they do not really contradict an optimistic 
view of existence. 

So far as we can tell, there need be no real waste, no 
real loss, no annihilation; but everything sufl&ciently valu- 
able, be it beauty, artistic achievement, knowledge, un- 
selfish affection, may be thought of as enduring henceforth 
and forever if not with an individual and personal exist- 
ence, yet as part of the eternal Being of God. 

And this carries with it the persistence of personality 
in all creatures who have risen to the attainment of God- 
like faculties, such as self-determination and other attri- 
butes which suggest kinship with Deity and make their pos- 
sessor a member of the Divine family. For whether or 
not this incipient theory of the conservation of value stand 
the test of criticism, it is undeniable that . . . seers do not 
hesitate to attribute permanence and timeless existence to 
the essential element in man himself. They realize that 



234 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

he is one with the universe, that he may come to be in 
tmie with the infinite, and that his spasmodic efforts towards 
a state wherein the average will rise to a level now attained 
by only a few, are part of the evolutionary travailing of 
the whole creation. . . . What we are claiming is no less 
than this — that, whereas it is certain that the present 
body cannot long exist without the soul, it is quite possible 
and indeed necessary for the soul to exist without the present 
body. We base this claim on the soul's manifest transcend- 
ence, on its genuine reality, and on the general law of the 
persistence of all real existence. 

Sir Oliver Lodge 

352 

Philosophy introduces us thus into the spiritual life. 
And it shows us at the same time the relation of the life 
of the spirit to that of the body. The great error of the 
doctrines on the spirit has been the idea that by isolating 
the spiritual life from all the rest, by suspending it in 
space as high as possible above the earth, they were placing 
it beyond attack, as if they were not thereby simply ex- 
posing it to be taken as an effect of mirage. . . . They 
are right to believe in the absolute reality of the per- 
son and in his independence toward matter; but science 
is there, which shows the interdependence of conscious life 
and cerebral activity. They are right to attribute to man 
a privileged place in nature, to hold that the distance is 
infinite between the animal and man; but the history of 
life is there, which makes us witness the genesis of species by 
gradual transformation, and seems thus to reintegrate man 
in animality. When a strong instinct assures the prob- 
ability of personal survival, they are right not to close their 
ears to its voice; but if there exist " souls " capable of an 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 235 

independent life, whence do they come? . . . All these 
questions will remain mianswered ... if we do not re- 
solve to see the life of the body just where it really is, on 
the road that leads to the life of the spirit. . . . 

[Souls] are nothing else than the little rills into which 
the great river of life, flowing through the body of hu- 
manity, divides itself. The movement of the stream is 
distinct from the river bed, although it must adopt its 
winding course. Consciousness is distinct from the organism 
it animates, although it must undergo its vicissitudes . . . 
the destiny of consciousness is not bound up . . . with 
the destiny of cerebral matter. Consciousness is essen- 
tially free; it is freedom itself. . . . 

As the smallest grain of dust is bound up with our en- 
tire solar system, ... so all organized beings, from the 
humblest to the highest, from the first origins of life to the 
time in which we are, and in all places as in all times, do 
but evidence a single impulsion. . . . All the living hold 
together, and all yield to the same tremendous push. The 
animal takes his stand on the plant, man bestrides ani- 
mality; and the whole of humanity, in space and in time, 
is one immense army galloping beside and before and be- 
hind each of us in an overwhelming charge able to beat 
down every resistance and clear the most formidable ob- 
stacles, perhaps even death. 

Henri Bergson 

353 

. . . What are the things which most bear the impress 
of the Eternal, — which seem most truly to mirror the 
power of God? Wisdom, love, duty, joyous and free ser- 
vice. 

But what do these words mean? They express personal 



236 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

qualities, they are attributes of a living being. They are 
doubtless potentialities of the universe, bound up in its 
necessary causation, but to us they have been revealed in 
human consciousness. 

For unnumbered ages atoms have been moved about by 
forces as indestructible as themselves. They have floated 
in mists of fire, they have been gathered into molten billows, 
they have been whirled into worlds and systems of worlds, 
they have risen into clouds, they have fallen in rain, they 
have risen again in grass-blades and flowers and trees. 
They have been organized into creatures that breathe and 
creep and fly, and they return again into dust. 

. . . But the time comes when there is something more. 
Out of the dust there emerges a creature whose existence in 
the material world is nothing short of a miracle. Connect 
him as closely as you may with all that went before, and yet 
the amazing fact remains that his being carries him into 
another sphere which transcends the familiar round of physi- 
cal causation. His language is strange in this world of 
law. Is it only a chance concourse of atoms, organized 
into a brain, as yesterday they may have been organized 
into the needs of the roadside, from which comes the con- 
fident voice: I love, I hope, I worship eternal beauty, I 
off'er myself in obedience to a perfect law of righteous- 
ness, I gladly suffer tliat others may be saved, I resist 
the threatening evil that I see, I choose not the easy way, 
but the difl&cult way, my will shall not yield to circum- 
stance, but only to a higher will. 

Molecules, however organized, do not naturally thus 
utter themselves. Chemical reactions are not thus ex- 
pressed. There are no equivalents for this new power in 
the mechanical forces. ... A universe out of which there 
emerges a living will cannot be purposeless. In the light 
of the living will the history of the Fast must be written, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 237 

and this newly revealed force throws a penetrating light 
into the future. Here is something that has an eternal 
meaning. Here is the first glimpse of infinitude that really 
satisfies. The infinitudes of Time and Space and Physical 
Force awe us at first, and then tire us. It is because they 
are infinite in extent, but not infinite in value. We very 
quickly exhaust their meaning, and then there is the sense 
of monotonous repetition. . . . 

. . . But the glimpse of spiritual infinitude is like the 
glimpse of mountains towering above us, range upon range, 
peak upon peak. Looking up we see no end, we are in- 
spired by the immensities. There is in us the unstilled de- 
sire for that which lies beyond. Did ever lover tire of the 
thought of love eternal, the vaster passion gathering all 
unto itself, guarding all and keeping all? The truth-lover 
tires of accumulation of unrelated facts, but he does 
not tire of Truth, Truth vitalized and harmonized. Di- 
vine ideas ever find us young and ever keep us so. . . . 

. . . This is that of which — when the clouds are off 
our souls — we dare assert immortality. . . . 

. . . The wondering joy in life inspires a deeper con- 
fidence than many a laboured argument. It is a faith that 
is born anew in unselfish friendship. Many a man, who 
would not claim immortality for himself, yet reverently 
recognizes in another greater than himself "the power of 
an endless life." 

Samuel McChord Crothers 

354 

The man of moral seriousness, who looks on life as a 
sacred privilege and trust, who has visions of heights to 
which his spiritual nature may climb, who has touched 
depths of refining spiritual experience — depths that are 



238 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

prophetic of others deeper still; the man who is capable 
of high and ennobling friendships, whose horizon embraces 
aims that are exalting and exalted, that man will look on 
immortality as a priceless boon, not because of any op- 
portunity that it offers for delights and rewards, but be- 
cause of the opportunity that it offers for continuing the 
task of spiritual sculpture, for rounding out his character, 
for completing the dimensions of his being, for maturing 
the great life-purpose, that here on earth had time only to 
blossom, or, perchance, only to bud. For such a man, 
with such moral experience, conscious of ever deeper and 
intenser moral living, no alternative is open but belief in 
survival of his essential spiritual selfhood, to be somehow 
fitted, equipped for further progress toward " the goal 
set up " for him, albeit he can form no visual image of 
this equipment and knows moral progress here only in 
connection with brain and other bodily equipment. . . . 

The only rational view of our earthly pilgrimage is 
that of a process of growth, upward and onward endlessly, 
a progressus ad Parnassum. If, then, when that pilgrimage 
ends, our goal be still like a star shining in the distant 
heaven and we look up from the low plane of our present 
attainment to that star, what escape is there from the fright- 
ful unreason of such a situation? It is, so far as I can 
see, that death does not terminate the pilgrimage but that 
somehow, somewhere, opportunity is afforded for the per- 
petuation of what is essentially spiritual in us, to the end 
that it may continue its consecrated devotion to the su- 
preme purpose of its being. 

To my reason immortality is the only possible solution 
to the mystery of life. 

Alfred W. Martin 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 239 

355 

... No man in those hours when he is intellectually and 
spiritually at his best can consent, without violence to his 
profoundest instincts, to believe in a world that loses all 
its gains, a world in which nothing that we have willed 
or hoped or dreamed of good shall exist. Without some 
form of personal permanence that issue to the cosmic pro- 
cess seems inevitable. 

. . . The man who lives as though he were immortal 
lives in a universe where the highest spiritual values are 
permanent, outlasting the growth and dissolution of the 
stars; where personality, whether in himself or others, is 
infinitely precious and has everlasting issues; where char- 
acter is the supreme concern of life, in behalf of which all 
else may reasonably be sacrificed; where no social service 
ever can be vain, if it registers itself in even one man 
made better, and where, in all public-minded devotion to 
moral causes on the earth, we are not digging artificial 
lakes to be filled by our own buckets, in hopeless contest 
with an alien universe, but rather building channels down 
which the eternal spiritual purpose of the living God shall 
flow to its " far off divine event." 

. . . Death is a great adventure, but none need go un- 
convinced that there is an issue to it. The man of faith 
may face it as Columbus faced his first voyage from the 
shores of Spain. What lies across the sea he cannot tell; 
his special expectations all may be mistaken; but his insight 
into the clear meanings of present facts may persuade him 
beyond doubt that the sea has another shore. Such con- 
fident faith, so founded upon reasonable grounds, shall 
be turned to sight, when, for all the dismay of the un- 
believing, the hope of the seers is rewarded by the vision of 
a new continent, Harry Emerson Fosdick 



240 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

356 

... By translation from this world to another new pos- 
sibilities are opened up. Here, however faithful may be 
the soul and however fully it may express itself in the out- 
ward life, this expression is at best incomplete, and only 
prophetic of that which is yet to be. But in the case of 
less perfect characters the need of such translation is still 
more imperative, and there comes a time when it becomes 
apparent that further progress in this world is barred, 
whether owing to self-wrought or inherited incapacities or 
outward causes of arrested development springing it may 
be from the hand of God Himself. And yet, in the case 
of such characters, how often are the good and evil qualities 
intermingled in such a way that it is clear that finally only 
the good will survive — that the strong sense of right and 
truth will in due time master the traditional proneness 
to wrong and deception, the inner gentleness and largeness 
of spirit rise superior to the temporary declensions into 
suspicious resentful tempers, and the high purposes ulti- 
mately extinguish every unworthy habit and bring every 
unruly passion into obedience to the spirit of Christ. Not 
what the man now is, but what he aspires to be, is the real 
man, and when death removes him from this life's fitful 
fever and troubled environment, this is the picture he leaves 
behind him in the hearts of those who knew and loved 
him, and this is the ideal he is already on the way to 
achieve, armed wifth fresh powers and enriched with fresh 
opportunities. 

R. H. Charles D. Litt 

357 

It is becoming increasingly hard to find where death 
achieves its victory. Man has perfected a hundred devices 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 241 

to perpetuate his mortal acts. His voice is caught on 
rolling disks, and held imperishable for the ears of his 
grandchildren. Gestures of his hands, the pantomime of his 
face, are recorded on films that can be laid away for a 
century and then unspun and projected on screens. If the 
breath of his body and his chance actions are so worthy of 
long continuing, then his spirit, that is finer than they, 
may be even more persisting, and impress itself on what is 
more durable than wax. If death cannot carry away into 
oblivion tones of his voice ntor the spectacle of his ways, 
it does not become us to doubt that death does not scatter 
spirit beyond recall, nor altogether end what was so ar- 
dent. 

Arthur Gleason 



358 

There is a plant of the Syrian deserts — the Rose of 
Jericho — about the size of our common daisy plant, and 
bearing a similiar flower, which in dry seasons, when the 
earth about its roots is turned into mere sand, has the pres- 
ence of mind to detach itself from its hold altogether and 
roll itself into a mere ball — flower, root, and all. It is 
then blown along the plains by the wind, and travels away 
until it reaches some moist and sheltered spot, when it ex- 
pands again and takes hold on the ground, uplifts its head, 
and merrily blooms once more. Like the little rose of 
Jericho, the human soul has at times to draw in its roots 
(which we may compare to the animal part) and separate 
them from their earthly entanglement; even the sun in 
heaven, which it knows distantly for the source of its 
life, may be obscured; but compacting itself for the nonce 
into a sturdy ball, it starts gaily on its far adventure. 

Edward Carpenter 



242 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

359 
IN THE HUT 

. . . The hut was empty. I chopped some wood and 
made a fire, fetched water from the spring and cooked my 
evening meaL For an hour or more I have lain in the 
straw and tried to sleep; in vain! That door swings ajar; 
symbols besiege me and press for interpretation. The 
stars bum brighter and brighter; the torrents roar; and the 
glacier gleams cold and white, coiled in the jaws of the 
abyss. It is the type of death as the valley was of life. 
And it is to wrestle with death that I am here alone. 

But I dare not face him yet ; I recognize that I am afraid. 
Let me turn back then to life, and record, for my assur- 
ance, the truth my thought has long divined and vision 
today confirmed. Nothing exists but individuals in the 
making. All things live, yes, even those we call inani- 
mate. A soul, or a myriad souls, inform the rocks and 
streams and winds. Innumerable centres of life leap 
in joy down the torrent; or it may be some diffused and 
elemental spirit singly sustains that ever-flowing form. The 
sea is a passion, the air and the light a will and a desire. 
All things together, each in his kind, each in his rank, 
press upwards, moved by love, to a goal that is good. 
What that goal is, I do not closely inquire, neither do I ask 
after the origin or meaning of the Whole. I cling to the 
fact I know, to movement and its cause ; the fact I know from 
the soul of Man and infer in Nature. What He is, She is; 
and what He is, I know. He is discord straining to har- 
mony, ignorance to knowledge, fear to courage, hate and 
indifference to love. He is a system out of equilibrium, 
and therefore moving towards it; he is the fall of the stone, 
the flow of the stream, the orbit of the star, rendered in the 
truth of passion and desire. To apprehend Reality is 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 243 

the goal of his eternal quest. . . . The horizons of death 
and birth shut us in. And even of the interspace we are 
not free, for we are pent in our own faculties. Something 
these reveal, but most they hide. We have five senses, but 
we have no more; we have a brain, but its beats are timed. 
Born into a shell, we grow till we reach its limits; the rest 
is retrocession or frustration. To shatter the shell is the 
destiny of life; but it can only be shattered by death. There 
is the paradox of our being. If death be death, life is 
not life; if life be life, death is not death. For either life 
is nothing or it is the overcoming of death. That I know 
and to that pass I am come. All I can do in this prison 
of the flesh I have done; I have learnt what I can learn, 
and I have felt what I can feel. At every point my grow- 
ing soul presses against her walls. And now at last they 
begin to crack. Beams of strange light shoot here and 
there across the darkness; liquid notes break upon the 
silence. I am ripe for my metamorphosis; and yet, oh 
shame! I know that I fear it. And before me lies the 
symbol of my fear, the space, the cold, the solitude, the 
uncommunicating Powers. Above me shine the eternal 
stars, whither I am bound. But my way is over the moun- 
tain. Have I the courage to climb? 

ON THE SUMMIT 

Of all the dawns that I have watched in the mountains, 
never was one like that I saw today. I forgot the glacier, 
and was aware only of the stars. Through the chinks 
in my prison wall they blazed brighter and brighter, till 
where they shone it fell away, and I looked out on the 
Past. I knew myself to be more than myself, an epitome 
of the generations; and I travelled again, from the source, 
my life which is the life of Man. I was a shepherd pas- 



244 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

turing flocks on star-lit plains of Asia; I was an Egyptian 
priest on his tower conning the oracles of the sky; I was 
a Greek sailor with Bootes and Orion for my guides; I was 
Endymion entranced on mountains of Arcady. I saw the 
star of Bethlehem and heard the angels sing; I spoke with 
Ptolemy, and watched the night with Galileo. A thousand 
times I had died, a thousand times been born. By these 
births and deaths my course was marked through the night 
of Time. But now I had come to sunrise. The stars began 
to fade; and solemn and slow the flower of dawn un- 
folded crystal petals, budded a violet, and blossomed a 
rose. The mountains lit their altars of amaranthine fire; 
and into his palace thus prepared rolled the chariot of 
the god, to the sound of the marching music to which crea- 
tion moves. 

I could not see the god, but I heard the music; and 
hearing it, I overcame fear. I was on the ice-slope, hung 
between the abyss and the sky. The chips of ice rattled 
and clinked to measureless depths below, and my nerves 
and senses shivered to hear them as they fell. But the 
very stress of anguish set my spirits free. As with a knife, 
that passage cut her loose from the flesh. Earth to earth, 
dust to dust, let the body drop back to the pit. But the 
soul has wings; and on the summit mine spread hers. For 
there at last I fronted the sun and the new world. The 
other world has vanished away, I know not how or whither. 
Before me stretches an ocean, untravelled and unplumbed; 
and sheer from its waters rise afar cliff's of rosy snow. 
The wall between me and the future is down; the sun 
streams through; and in my ears, more loud and more 
clear, sounds the marching music, to which I move, and with 
me all creation. . . . 

G. Lowes Dickinson 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 245 

360 

Slowly has passed the daily miracle. It is night. 
. . . Everything is sleeping, save only a single star and the 
pansies. This serenity of night! What could seem less 
likely ever more to move and change again today? And 
yet it is not so; the nightly miracle has passed; for the 
starling has begun its job, and the sun is fretting those dark 
busy wings with gold. Full day has come again! But 
the face of it is a little strange; it is not like yesterday. 
Queer — to think no day is like a day that is past, and 
no night like a night that is coming. 

Why then fear death, which is but night? Why care 
if next day have different face and spirit. . . . 

John Galsworthy 

361 

I was not aware of the moment when I first crossed the 
threshold of this life. 

What was the power that made me open out into this 
vast mystery like a bud in the forest at midnight! 

When in the morning I looked upon the light I felt 
in a moment that I was no stranger in this world, that the 
inscrutable without name and form had taken me in its arms 
in the form of my own mother. 

Even so, in death the same unknown will appear as even 
known to me. And because I love this life, I know I shall 
love death as well. 

The child cries out when from the right breast the 
mother takes it away, in the very next moment to find in 
the left one its consolation. 

Rabindranath Tagore 



246 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



362 

It is not arguments that convince one of the necessity 
of a future life. . . . Life and death — they are what 
convince a man. The sort of thing that convinces a 
man is when he sees a being dear to him, with whose life 
he has been intimately bound up, . . , and suddenly this 
being suffers, is tortured, and ceases to be. Why? It can- 
not be that there is no answer. I believe that there is 
one. . . . One must believe that we live not merely now 
on this patch of earth, but that we have lived and shall live 
eternally there in the universe. . . . 

Leo Tolstoi 



363 



Though I have watched so many mourners weep 
O'er the real dead, in dull earth laid asleep — 
Those dead seemed but the shadows of my days 
That passed and left me in the sun's bright rays. 
Now though you go on smiling in the sun 
Our love is slain, and love and you were one. 
You are the first, you I have known so long, 
"Whose death was deadly, a tremendous wrong. 
Therefore I seek the faith that sets it right 
Amid the lilies and the candle-light. 
I think on Heaven, for in that air so clear 
We two may meet, confused and parted here. 
Ah, when man's dearest dies, 'tis then he goes 
To that old balm that heals the centuries' woes. 
Then Christ's wild cry in all the streets is rife: — 
" I am the Resurrection and the Life." 

Vachel Lindsay 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 247 

364 

Lord of all Light and Darkness, 

Lord of all Life and Death, 
Behold, we lay in earth today 

The flesh that perisheth. 
Take to thyself whatever may 

Be not as dust and breath — 
Lord of all Light and Darkness, 

Lord of all Life and Death. 

William Watson 

365 

What, then, is Life — what Death? 

Thus the answer saith ; 

faithless mortal, bend thy head and listen: 

Down o'er the vibrant strings. 

That thrill, and moan, and mourn, and glisten, 

The Master draws his bow. 

A voiceless pause; then upward, see, it springs 

Free as a bird with disimprisoned wings! 

In twain the chord was cloven, 

While, shaken with woe, 

With breaks of instant joy all interwoven. 

Piercing the heart with lyric knife. 

On, on the ceaseless music sings, 

Restless, intense, serene; — 

Life is the downward stroke; the upward, Life; 

Death but the pause between. . . . 

Richard Watson Gilder 



248 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

366 

. . . There is no death. The thing that we call death 
Is but another, sadder name for life, 
Which is itself an insufficient name, 
Faint recognition of that unknown life, — 
That power whose shadow is the universe. 

Richard Henry Stoddard 

367 

Over the grave bends Love sobbing, and by her side 
stands Hope, and whispers — "We shall meet again. Be- 
fore all life is death, and after all death is life. The fall- 
ing leaf, touched with the hectic flush that testifies of 
autumn's death, is in a subtler sense, a prophecy of spring.'* 

Robert G. Ingersoll . 

368 

Under the wide and starry sky, 
Dig the grave and let me lie. 
Glad did I live and gladly die. 
And I laid me down with a will. 

This be the verse you grave for me: 
Here he lies where he longed to be; 
Home is the sailor, home from sea. 
And the hunter home from the hill, 

Robert Louis Stevenson 

369 

Bear me not with mourning to my grave, for shall not my 
spirit have leapt to God? 

Elizabeth Gibson 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 249 

370 

Our journey had advanced; 
Our feet were almost come 
To that odd fork in Being's road, 
Eternity by term. 

Our pace took sudden awe, 
Our feet reluctant led. 
Before were cities, but between. 
The forest of the dead. 

Retreat was out of hope, — 
Behind, a sealed route. 
Eternity's white flag before, 
And God at every gate. 

Emily Dickinson 

371 

Man comes a pilgrim of the universe. 

Out of the mysteries that were before 

The world, out of the wonder of old stars. 

Far roads have felt his feet, forgotten wells 

Have glassed his beauty bending down to drink. 

At altar-fires anterior to Earth 

His soul was lighted, and it will burn on 

After the suns have wasted in the void. 

His feet have felt the pressure of old worlds, 

And are to tread on others yet unnamed — 

Worlds sleeping yet in some new dream of God. 

Edwin Markham 



250 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

372 

Passage — immediate passage ! the blood bums in my veins I 

Away, soul! hoist instantly the anchor! 

Cut the hawsers — haul out — shake out every sail ! . . . 

Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only! 

Reckless, soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with nae; 

For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go. 

And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all. 

my brave soul! 

farther, farther sail! 

O daring joy, but safe! Are they not all the seas of God? 

farther, farther, farther sail! 

Walt Whitman 

373 

Joy, shipmate, joy! 
(Pleas'd to my soul at death, I cry) 
Our life is closed, our life begins, 
The long, long anchorage we leave, 
The ship is clear at last, she leaps! 
She swiftly courses from the shore, 
Joy, shipmate, joy! 

Walt Whitman 

374 

Not pleasure alone is good, but pain also; not joy alone 

but sorrow; 
Freed must the psyche be from the pupa, and pain is there to 

free it. 
Throes and struggles and clenchings of teeth — but pain is 

there to free it. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 251 

Lo ! the prison walls must fall — even though the prisoner 
tremble. 

Long the strain, sometimes seeming past endurance — then 
the dead shell gives way, and a new landscape dis- 
closes 

Curtain behind curtain, wall behind wall, life behind life. 

Dying here, to be borne there, passing and passing and pass- 
ing, 

At last a new creature behold, transfigured to more than 
mortal ! 

For brief after all is pain, but joy ah! joy is eternal! 
And then the veil that divides, the subtle film of illusion — 
The prison-wall so slight, at a touch it parts and crumbles, 
And opens at length on the sunlit world and the winds of 
heaven. 

Edward Carpenter 

375 

All night we hear the rattling flaw, 

The casements shiver with each breath ; 
And still more near the foemen draw, 

The pioneers of Death. 

Their grisly chieftain comes: 
He steals upon us in the night. 
Call up the guards! light every light! 

Beat the alarum drums. 

His tramp is at the outer door; 

He bears against the shuddering walls; 
Lo! what a dismal frost and hoar 

Upon the window falls! 
Feed, feed the watch-fires everywhere — 
Even yet their cheery warmth will scare 

This thing of night away. 



252 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Ye cannot ! something chokes the grate 

And clogs the air within its flues, 
And runners from the entrance gate 

Come chill with evil news; 

The bars are broken ope! 
Ha! he has scaled the inner wall! 
But fight him still, from hall to hall; 

While life remains, there's hope. 

Too late! the very frame is dust, 

The locks and trammels fall apart; 
He reaches scornful of their trust. 

The portals of the heart. 

Ay, take the citadel! 
But where, grim Conqueror, is thy prey? 
In vain thou'lt search each secret way, 

Its flight is hidden well. 

We yield thee, for thy paltry spoils, 

This shell, this ruin thou hast made; 
Its tenant has escaped thy toils. 
Though they were darkly laid. 
Even now, immortal, pure, 
It gains a house not made with hands, 
A refuge in serener lands, 
A heritage secure. 

E, C, Stedman 

376 

'Twas in another's pangs I hither came; 

'Tis in mine own that I anon depart. 
Birth, thou doorway hung with swords of flame, 

How like to Death thou art! 

William Watson 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 253 

377 

Death is only a second birth into a freer existence in 
which the spirit breaks through its slender covering and 
abandons inaction and sloth, as the child does in its first 
birth. . . . 

The spirit will no longer wander over mountain and 
field, or be surrounded by the delights of spring only to 
mourn that it all seems exterior to him; but, transcending 
earthly limitations, he will feel new strength and joy in 
growing. He will no longer struggle by persuasive words 
to produce a thought in others, but in the immediate in- 
fluence of souls upon each other, no longer separated by the 
body, but united spiritually, he will experience the joy of 
creative thought; he will not outwardly appear to the loved 
ones left behind, but will dwell in their inmost souls and 
think and act in and through them. 

For those souls which have grown together as one through 
their movements of sympathy, gain force each from the other 
. . . and at the same time confirmation as individuals 
through the union of their diversities. Those souls which 
have seized together upon a form or an idea of truth, 
beauty or goodness in their eternal purity, remain thereby 
united to all eternity and in like manner possess these ideals 
as a part of themselves in everlasting unity. . . . 

How much will man have to learn after death! For he 
must not think that at the first entrance, he will possess 
the whole divine perception for which the future life will 
offer the means. Even here the child first learns to see 
and hear ; for what he sees and hears in the beginning is un- 
comprehended appearance, is mere sound without meaning 
— at first only bewilderment, astonishment and confusion: 
and nothing different does the new life offer to the new child 
at first. Only what man brings with him from this life, the 



254 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

composite echo of memories of all he has done and thought 
and been here, does he see, in the transition, all at once 
clearly lighted up within itself, yet still he remains primarily 
only what he was. 

Gustav Fechner 



378 

" If men could guess what is in store for them when they 
die, they would not have the patience to live — they 
wouldn't wait. . . . 

"Nothing is lost — nothing! From the ineffable, high, 
fleeting thought a Shakespeare can't find words to express, 
to the slightest sensation of an earthworm — nothing ! Not 
a leaf's feeling of the light, not a loadstone's sense of the 
pole, not a single volcanic or electric thrill of the mother 
earth. . . . 

" ' As we sow we reap '; that is a true saying, and all the 
sowing is done here on earth, and the reaping beyond. 
Man is a grub; his dead clay, as he lies cofl&ned in his 
grave, is the left-ofif cocoon he has spun for himself during 
his earthly life, to burst open and soar from, with all his 
memories about him, even the lost ones. . . . We are all, 
tous tant que nous sommes, little bags of remembrance that 
never dies; that's what we're for. But we can only bring 
with us to the common stock what we've got. . . . 

" There are battles to be fought and races to be won, 
but no longer against ' each other.' And strength and swift- 
ness to win them; but no longer any strong and swift. 
There is weakness and cowardice, but no longer any cowards 
or weaklings. . . . 

" And the goal ? The cause, the whither and the why of 
it all? . . . As far as I can make it out, everything every- 
where seems to be an ever-deepen|n|, ^y§r-broadening 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 255 

stream that makes with inconceivable velocity for its own 
proper level, where perfection is! . . . and ever gets 
nearer, and never finds it, and fortunately never will! 

" Only that, unlike an earthly stream, and more like 
a fresh flowing tide up an endless, boundless, shoreless 
creek (if you can imagine that), the level it seeks is im- 
measurably higher than its source. And everywhere in it 
is Life, Life, Life! ever renewing and doubling itself, and 
ever swelling that mighty river which has no banks! 

"And everywhere in it, like begets like, plus a little 
better or a little worse; and the little worse finds its way 
back into some backwater and sticks there, and finally goes 
to the bottom, and nobody cares. And the little better 
goes on bettering and bettering — not all man's folly 
or perversions can hinder that, nor make that headlong tor- 
rent stay, or ebb, or roll backward for a moment.". . . 

" [And] who shall say where Shakespeare and you and 
I come in — tiny links in an endless chain, so tiny that 
even Shakespeare is no bigger than we! And just a little 
way behind us, those little wiggling transparent things, all 
stomach, that we descend from; and far ahead of our- 
selves, but in the direct line of a long descent from us, an 
ever-growing conscious Power, so strong, so glad, so simple, 
so wise, so mild, and so beneficent, that what can we do, 
even now, but fall on our knees with our foreheads in the 
dust, and our hearts brimful of wonder, hope and love, and 
tender shivering awe; and worship as a yet unborn, barely 
conceived, and scare begotten Child — that which we have 
always been taught to worship as a Father — That which 
is not now, but is to be — That which we shall all share in 
and be part and parcel of in the dim future — That which 
is slowly, surely, painfully weaving Itself out of us and 
the likes of us all through the limitless Universe, and Whose 
coming we can but faintly foretell by the casting of its 



256 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

shadow on our own slowly, surely, painfully awakening 
souls! " 

George Du Maurier 

379 

If the universe, ... is really a home to us, we shall 
find it more of a home when we are rid of the litter and 
phantoms of this life, which are here our property and 
not ourselves. And we shall come into this home, not as 
strangers needing to learn the customs and the language, 
but as exiles returning with memories awakened at every 
step. Everywhere we shall recognize those people and 
things that are according to our idea and memory of home, 
as we now recognize a great tune when we hear it for the 
first time. It is as if we were helping to make it our- 
selves. It is we ourselves that speak in it and say what 
we have always wanted to say. So this future life will 
seem to be ours and always to have been ours; only we 
have never managed to live in it before. It will be the 
expression of what we always knew about reality but could 
not even dare to whisper to ourselves. Nor will it seem 
to be a reward to us but rather something that we have been 
fools not to make for ourselves before. Music is not a 
prize for being good; it is not something that the musician 
imposes upon us, but a revelation that suddenly we share 
with him. And we share it only because in our values we 
are his equals and of like mind with him, though we 
could not have expressed our minds without his help. That 
is an image of our equality with God. He makes the music 
and we recognize it; and He does not make the music for 
Himself, but for us; His joy is in our recognition of it; 
and to be one with us in that recognition. 

Reality, to me, here, is in what I love, not in what I 
hate; and I do not love from mere habit and just what 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 257 

happens to be around me. I love from recognition of what 
is everlastingly lovable; and this will last into a future 
state. It is the spirit that gives form, and the beauty of 
things made by man is the form given to them by the spirit 
of man. So, as the spirit will persist, the beauty will per- 
sist also and will be of the same nature, whether it come 
from man or from God, and whatever its material may be. 
The beauty we shall recognize even if its material be strange 
to us. We shall not have to learn it all afresh; and we 
shall recognize it the more easily because all our present 
ugly phantoms of beauty will be gone. So will the false 
phantoms we mistake for truth, and the evil phantoms we 
miscall goodness. 

In this life progress means that we become freer of the 
tyranny of the past. I am aware of progress in myself 
when I am able suddenly to live in the present and no 
longer to see it only through the phantoms of my own past. 
Only then do I become myself, and not something else 
subject to what I have been. The difficulty, for us, is to 
go on being freshly ourselves in an eternally fresh rela- 
tion with what is. We are always falling behind our actual 
experience, judging it as if it were a something that had 
happened before, as if it were actually in the past for us; 
and so we judge other men as if they were tied by their 
past. That is how we find it so difficult to forget and for- 
give. They are to us what they have done; and we become 
to ourselves what we have done; and so come to think 
of all things as bound by a chain of cause and effect. 
But progress in another life will be a greater freedom from 
the tyranny of the past. We shall begin afresh, but it will 
be we ourselves that begin. All status will be swept away 
like cobwebs. We shall love Shakespeare for himself and 
not for his reputation, and we shall come nearer to loving 
God also for Himself and not for His reputation. . . . 



258 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

If in that other life God is more instant to us, more 
plainly revealed in a more piercing righteousness, truth, 
and beauty, it may be we shall suffer a sharper pain than 
here for our failure to rise to our opportimity. Beauty 
often makes us sad here, because we are ourselves in- 
adequate to it. There our inadequacy may make the far 
greater beauty almost intolerable to us. We shall have lost 
all our comfortable unrealities, our sense of status, our 
vulgarities, our formulae, and our hostile generalizations; 
we shall have no one to encourage us in our nonsense; 
and we shall be face to face, all naked and bare as we 
are, with that which here we call the beatific vision. We 
shall know that it is the beatific vision; and yet it will hurt 
us with our own inadequacy to experience it. . . . This sub- 
limity of the beatific vision is not a cold sublimity, as we 
often suppose; it is not a sublimity emptied of all content 
or absorbed in the enjoyment of itself. There is desire in 
it calling to our desire, the love of God calling to the love 
of man; and it is the urgency of the call that will pain 
us. — To fail in the answer to this ineffable appeal, to baffle 
the desire of God with the faintness of our own desire, 
that will be the pain of Heaven. Nor shall we know, nor 
shall God know, whether we shall ever be able to satisfy 
His desire with our own. But at least the pain of ours 
will be real, as his desire is real. It will be real like the 
sorrow of a great piece of music, not unreal like the 
routine of this life to which we subdue ourselves even 
while we rebel against it. It will be real like the Cruci- 
fixion, which continues for ever and must continue, until 
man has risen to an equality with God; for that time is 
hidden in the darkness of the future, for it rests with man 
himself whether he shall so rise. But all the glory and 
the beauty of the universe is in the desire of God for man 
to be equal with Himself, and in the answering desire of 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 259 

man. And that also is the beauty and glory of heaven, 
more intense than on earth because there man is closer 
to God. 

A, Clutton-Brock 

380 

Not with vain tears when we're beyond the sun, 
We'll beat on the substantial doors, nor tread 
Those dusty high-roads of the aimless dead 
Plaintive for Earth; but rather turn and run 
Down some close-covered by-way of the air, 
Some low sweet alley between wind and wind. 
Stoop under faint gleams, tread the shadows, find 
Some whispering ghost-forgotten nook, and there 
Spend in sweet converse our eternal day; 
Think each in each, immediately wise; 
Learn all we lacked before; hear, know and say 
What this tumultuous body now denies; 
And feel, who have laid our groping hands away; 
And see, no longer blinded by our eyes. 

Rupert Brooke 

381 

When Earth's last picture is painted and the tubes are 

twisted and dried, 
When the oldest colours have faded, and the youngest critic 

has died, 
We shall rest, and, faith, we shall need it — lie down for 

an aeon or two, 
Till the Master of All Good Workmen shall put us to work 

anew. 

And those that were good shall be happy: they shall sit in 
a golden chair; 






260 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

They shall splash at a ten-league canvas with brushes of 

comets' hair; 
They shall find real saints to draw from — Magdalene, 

Peter, and Paul, 
They shall work for an age at a sitting, and never be tired 

at all. 

And only the Master shall praise us, and only the Master 

shall blame; 
And no one shall work for money, and no one shall work 

for fame. 
But each for the joy of the working, and each, in his 

separate star. 
Shall draw the Thing as he sees It for the God of Things 
as They are! 

Rudyard Kipling 

382 

Marlowe is dead, and Greene is in his grave, 
And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone! 

Our Ocean-shepherd sleeps beneath the wave; 

Robin is dead, and Marlowe in his grave. 

Why should I stay to chant another stave. 
And in my Mermaid Tavern drink alone? 

For Kit is dead and Greene is in his grave, 
And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone. 

Where is the singer of the Faerie Queen? 

Where are the lyric lips of Astrophel? 
Long, long ago, their quiet graves were green; 
Ay, and the grave, too, of their Faerie Queen! 
And yet their faces, hovering here unseen. 

Gall me to taste their new-found oenomel; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 261 

To sup with him who sang the Faerie Queen; 

To drink with him whose name was Astrophel. 

I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave! 

If there be none, the gods have done us wrong. 
Ere long I hope to chant a better stave, 
In some great Mermaid Inn beyond the grave; 
And quaff the best of earth that heaven can save, 

Red wine like blood, deep love of friends and song. 
I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave; 

And hope to greet my golden lads ere long. 

Alfred Noyes 

383 

^To range, deep-wrapt, along a heavenly height, 

0*erseeing all that man but imdersees; 
To loiter down lone valleys of delight, 

And hear the beating of the hearts of trees. 
And think the thoughts that lilies speak in white 

By greenwood pools.and pleasant passages; 

With healthy dreams a-dream in flesh and soul, 

To pace, in mighty meditations drawn, 
From out the forest to the open knoll 

Where much thyme is, whence blissful leagues of lawn 
Betwixt the fringing woods to southward roll 

By tender inclination ; mad with dawn. 

Ablaze with fires that flame in silver dew 

When each small globe doth glass the morning-star, 

Long ere the sun, sweet-smitten through and through 
With dappled revelations read afar, 

1 Bayard Taylor. 



I 



262 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Suffused with saintly ecstasies of blue 
As all the holy eastern heavens are — 

To fare thus fervid to what daily toil 
Employs thy spirit in that larger Land 

Where thou art gone; to strive, but not to moil 
In nothings that do mar the artist's hand, 

Not drudge unriched, as grain rots back to soil — 
No profit out of death . . . 

... my Friend, 
Freely to range, to muse, to toil, is thine: 

Thine, now, to watch with Homer sails that bend 
Unstained by Helen's beauty o'er the brine 

Towards some clean Troy no Hector need defend 
Nor flame devour; or, in some mild moon's shine, 

Where amiabler winds the whistle heed. 
To sail with Shelley o'er a bluer sea. 

And mark Prometheus, from his fetter freed, 
Pass with Deucalion over Italy, 

While bursts the flame from out his eager reed 
Wild-stretching towards the West of destiny; 

Or, prone with Plato, Shakespeare and a throng 
Of bards beneath some plane-tree's cool eclipse 

To gaze on glowing meads where, lingering long, 
Psyche's large butterfly her honey sips; 

Or, mingling free in choirs of German song. 
To learn of Goethe's life from Goethe's lips; 

These, these are thine, and we, who still are dead. 
Do yearn — nay, not to kill thee back again 

Into this chamel life, this lowlihead. 

Not to the dark of sense, the blinking brain, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 263 

The hugged delusions drear, the hunger fed 
On husks of guess, the monarchy of pain . . . 

Not unto thee, bright spirit, do we yearn 

To bring thee back, but oh, to be, to be 
Unbound of all these gyves, to stretch, to spurn 

The dark from off our dolorous lids, to see 
Our spark, conjecture, blaze and sunwise burn, 

And suddenly to stand again by thee! 

Ah, not for us, not yet, by thee to stand: 

For us, the fret, the dark, the thorn, the chill; 

For us, to call across unto thy Land, 

*' Friend, get thee to the minstrel's holy hill, 

And kiss those brethren for us mouth and hand, 
And make our duty to our Master Will." 

Sidney Lanier 

384 

Call me not dead when I, indeed, have gone 
Unto the company of the everliving 
High and most glorious poets! Let thanksgiving 
Rather be made. Say : " He at last hath won 

Rest and release, converse supreme and wise, 
Music and song and light of immortal faces; 
Today, perhaps, wandering in starry places. 
He hath met Keats, and known him by his eyes. 

Tomorrow (who can say?) Shakespeare may pass, 
And our lost friend just catch one syllable 
Of that three-centuried wit that kept so well; 

Or Milton; or Dante, looking on the grass 
Thinking of Beatrice, and listening still 
To chanted hymns that sound from the heavenly hill." 

Richard Watson Gilder 



264 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

385 

It is hard to speak of the dead when one loves to 
think them still alive, when they are still near to us, when 
they are still enwrapt in the fierce blinding light of the 
battlefield. I can only think of her as still keeping her 
vigil over the advancing hosts of the proletariat, in whose 
war she enlisted as a healer of wounds and a comforter of 
sorrows. ... I cannot but think of her as sitting peace- 
fully in the great shadows, holding hands with Rosa Luxem- 
burg, her sister, and listening to her story, and telling her 
of you and of America, and of the wonderful things that are 
to be. And I know that both smile and are happy that 
you and I have grown strong and wise enough to refrain, 
for the love of them, from too many words and too easy 

tears ^ 

Arturo Giovannitti 

386 

The roof of man is fragile, the fire on his hearth dies 
out; the nest is torn by winds and weather, its inmates 
scattered to the four corners of earth. Amid the wreck 
of the home in which we were reared, and the ruins life goes 
on heaping up around us, we are seized with the home- 
sickness for an eternal dwelling-place. Our hope is in an 
abiding city where there shall be no more mourning or 
separation, where no one shall be an orphan, or astray, 

1 That would be a glorious life for me there where I might meet 
Palamedes, and Ajax, the son of Telamon, and others perhaps who 
long ago perished by an unrighteous judgment, and how glad I 
should be to compare my wrongs with theirs. But the greatest joy 
would be in questioning the inhabitants there as I do here, and ex- 
amining them to discover who is really wise and who only in his own 
conceit. What would not a man give to examine the leader of the 
great Trojan armament, or Odysseus, or Sisyphus, or any of a thou- 
sand other men and women whom it would be our infinite joy to meet 
and question and call our friends. — Socrates. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 265 

or solitary; where the pilgrim arrived at his journey's 
end shall shake off the dust from his feet and lay down 
his staff; where the whole great family, at length complete 
and reconciled, shall take its rest in the peace of the 
heavenly home. 

We love thee the more, humble roof of earth, because 
thy bonds and thy affections are the human prophecy of 
a divine accomplishment; because thou art the symbol of 
that shelter not made with hands, the Father's house in 
which are many mansions. 



Charles Wagner 



387 



Softly Christophe closed his eyes. . . . 

. . . "Mothers, lovers, friends. . . . Where are you? 
Where are you, my souls? I know that you are there, and 
I cannot take you." 

"We are with thee. Peace, beloved! " 

" I will not lose you ever more. I have sought you 
so long! " 

" Be not anxious. We shall never leave thee more." 

"Alas! The stream is bearing me on." 

"The river that bears thee on, bears us with thee." 

" Whither are you going? " 

"To the place where we shall be united once more." 

"Will it be soon?" 

"Look." 

And Christophe, making supreme effort to raise his head 
. . . saw the river overflowing its banks, covering the 
fields, moving on, august, slow, almost still. And, like 
a flash of steel, on the edge of the horizon there seemed 
to be speeding toward him a line of silver streams, quiver- 
ing in the sunlight. The roar of the ocean. . . . And his 
heart sank, and he asked: 



266 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

" Is it He? " 

And the voices of his loved ones replied: 

"It is He!" 

And his dying brain said to itself: 

"The gates are opened. . . . That is the chord I was 
seeking! . . . But it is not the end! There are new spaces! 
. . . We will go on, tomorrow." 

Romain Rolland 

388 

To an open house in the evening 

Home shall men come, 

To an older place than Eden, 

To a taller town than Rome. 

To the end of the way of the wandering star, 

To the things that cannot be and that are. 

To the place where God was homeless. 

And all men are at home. 

G. K. Chesterton 



389 

If I should die, think only this of me: 
That there's some corner of a foreign field 
That is for ever England. There shall be 
In that rich earth a richer dust conceal'd; 
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, 
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam; 
A body of England's, breathing English air. 
Washed by the rivers, blest by sun of home. 

And think, this heart, all evil shed away, 
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 267 

Gives somewhere back the thoughts of England given; 
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; 
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness 
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven. 

Rupert Brooke 

390 

^To have lived and loved — yea, even for a little. 

To have known the sun and fulness of the earth; 

To have tested joy nor stayed to prove it brittle, 

And travelled grief to find it end in mirth; 

To have loved the good in life, and followed, groping, 

Beauty that lives among the common things. 

Awaiting, eager-eyed and strongly hoping. 

The fain far beating of an angel's wings. 

All of these were his. And with his soul's releasing, 
Dearest of all, immortal youth has crowned him, 
And that bright spirit is young eternally; 
Dreaming, he hears the great winds blow unceasing, 
And over him, above him and around him. 
The music and the thunder of the sea. 

Crommelin Brown 

391 

^ Once in my garret — you being far away 
Tramping the hills and breathing upland air. 
Or so I fancied — brooding in my chair, 
I watched the London sunshine feeble and grey 
Dapple my desk, too tired to labour more. 
When, looking up, I saw you standing there 

1 Rupert Brooke. 



268 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Although I'd caught no footstep on the stair, 
Like sudden April at my open door. 

Though now heyond earth's farthest hills you fare, 

Song-crowned, immortal, sometimes it seems to me 

That, if I listen very quietly. 

Perhaps I'll hear a light foot on the stair 

And see you, standing with your angel air, 

Fresh from the uplands of eternity. 

Wilfred Wilson Gibson 

392 

You called to me from o'er the restless tide: 

Within the deepening shades of Death's confines, 

— Like winds grown free among the forest pines 

Did set my spirit free: and like a bride — 

Like a lost mistress to a lover sad — 

Led my young spirit unto Love: relit 

The flame, the dream where two friends long ago would sit 

Together happy, disunited mad. 

So near to death, friend, have I grown to thee — 
Grown to thy soul like ivy to the wall. 
Beheld a dream of Love's eternity . . . 
Near to the grave, beneath a soldier's pall. 
If time ne'er grants our friendship future span 
Know, friend, we meet in spirit Man to Man! 

Sergt. J. N. Streets 

393 

Because of you we will be glad and gay, 
Remembering you we will be brave and strong; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 269 

And hail the advent of each dangerous day, 
And meet the great adventure with a song. 
And as you proudly gave your jewelled gift, 
We'll give our lesser offering with a smile. 
Nor falter on that path where, all too swift. 
You led the way and leapt the golden stile. 

Whether new paths, new heights to climb you find 
Or gallop through the unfooted asphodel, 
We know you know we shall not lag behind. 
Nor halt to waste a moment on a tear; 
And you will speed us onward with a cheer. 
And wave beyond the stars that all is well. 



M.B. 



394 



All ye who fought since England was a name. 

Because her soil was holy in your eyes; 
Who heard the summons and confessed Her claim, 

Who flung against a world's time-hallow'd lies 
The truth of English freedom — fain to give 

Those last lone moments, careless of your pain, 
Knowing that only so must England live 

And win by sacrifice, the right to reign — 
Be glad, that still the spur of your bequest 

Urges your heirs their threefold way along — 
The way of Toil that craveth not for rest. 

Clear Honour, and stark Will to punish wrong! 
The seed ye sow'd God quicken'd with His breath; 

The crop has ripen'd — lo, there is no death! 

Anonymous 



270 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 



395 



... By Yser banks where yellow flags do flaunt 
Their beauty, like the Shropshire calm canal 
That charmed my childhood, where white lilies haunt 
The troubled deep, blooming for burial; 

There lies youth ended on the very edge 
Of war, where freshly comes a charmed rose 
From ruined garden; there by foreign hedge, 
Hallow'd in God's free earth you have repose. 

There while the blasts of battle rend and scar 
Nature's calm loveliness, was briefly said, 
Half heard in the loud obloquy of war. 
The dear and simple ritual of the dead. 

And here from lavish lap of young July 

In English gardens climb and riot still 

Roses untorn; and fledgling finches try 

Here in God's peace their homely joyous trill. . , . 

Ah even there divinely to your ken 
The vision comes, more clear for one farewell, 
Your village home, the church that fronts the fen, 
Our Flanders; yea for them, for us you fell. 

Too young! ay me too young for love to lose. 
Love human blind; but old enough for eyes. 
Pure prescient eyes of death, that deeply choose, 
Yea, old enough for death, divinely wise. 

Some human tears will fall; some tender note 
Will haunt our wandering by canal and road; 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 271 

The stricken poplars lie, the lilies float; 

They fade; home, home; you live and grow in God. . . . 

Rest, home and rest; for you fulfillment, calm: 
To your free spirit still from opening road 
Call and appeal; afar the happy palm 
Haunts the clear height, and holds the gleam of God. 

R. Fanshawe 



396 

"When I behold dear youth sent down to death; 
And homely cities barbarously sacked; 
Christ's followers here denying what he saith, 
Christian in babbled word, heathen in act; 
Nations all bloody from fraternal strife; 
And beauty powerless as a broken wing; 
Then I despair of faith and art and life — 
Until I hear this inward clarion ring: 
"Rate not too richly peace and happiness. 
Sorrow and war have each their lively sap, 
Eternal truth unfoiled by temporal stress. 
Immortal being unharmed by mortal hap." 
Then do I know that nothing can work wrong 
To men or man, nor vex them over long. 

Wallace Bertram Nichols 

397 

They have not gone from us. no ! they are 
The inmost essence of each thing that is 
Perfect for us; they flame in every star; 
The trees are emerald with their presences. 
They are not gone from us; they do not roam 



272 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

The flaw and turmoil of the lower deep, 

But have now made the whole wide world their home, 

And in its loveliness themselves they steep. 

They fail not ever; theirs is the dium 
Splendour of sunny hill and forest grave; 
In every rainbow's glittering drop they burn; 
They dazzle in the massed clouds' architrave; 
They chant in every wind, and they return 
In the long roll of any deep blue wave. 

Robert Nichols 



398 

"Killed!" did you say? 
He is not killed, but overwhelmed with life. 
Outweighed with glory, overcome with pride, 
Outstripping others in the world-wide strife. 
And marching side by side with Christ his guide. 

"Killed!" did you say? 

He is not killed, but superfused with sight 

Of Christ his Saviour bidding him ascend. 

Where Saints and Martyrs crown the Warrior-knight, 

Who gives his life for brother, sister, friend. 

"Killed!" did you say? 
He is not killed, for you are on the way 
Where Christ your Priest will offer you a place 
Amongst the sainted souls in white array 
Who, through the sacrifice, have saved the race. 

W. Evans De Beauvoir 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 273 

399 

Not on an Altar shall mine eyes behold Thee 
Tho' Thou art sacrifice, Thou too art Priest; 

Bend, that the feeble arms of Love enfold Thee, 
So Faith shall bloom, increased. 

Not on a Cross, with passion buds around Thee, 
Thou — crowned and lonely, in Thy suffering; 

Nay, but as watching Mary met and found Thee, 
Dawn-robed, the Risen King. 

Not in the past, but in the present glorious. 
Not in the future, that I cannot span. 

Living and breathing, over death victorious. 
My God. ... My Brother-Man. 

Ivan Adair 

400 

1. 

Saints have adored the lofty soul of you.^ 

Poets have whitened at your high renown. 

We stand among the many millions who 

Do hourly wait to pass your pathway down. 

You, so familiar, once were strange: we tried 

To live as of your presence unaware. 

But now in every road on every side 

We see your straight and steadfast signpost there. 

I think it like that signpost in my land. 
Hoary and tall, which pointed me to go 
Upward, into the hills, on the right hand, 
1 Death. 



274 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

Where the mists swim and the winds shriek and blow, 
A homeless land and friendless, but a land 
I did not know and that I wished to know. 



Such, such is death: no triumph: no defeat. 
Only an empty pail, a slate rubbed clean, 
A merciful putting away of what has been. 
And this we know: Death is not Life effete. 
Life crushed, the broken pail. We who have seen 
So marvellous things know well the end's not yet. 

Victor and vanquished are a-one in death: 
Coward and brave: friend, foe. Ghosts do not say, 
" Come, what was your record when you drew breath? " 
But a big blot has hid each yesterday 
So poor, so manifestly incomplete, 
And your bright promise, withered long and sped, 
Is touched, stirs, rises, opens and grows sweet 
And blossoms and is you, when you are dead. 

Charles Hamilton Sorley 

401 

This night of Spring, beneath an alien sky, 

Is lit with flaming homesteads; a fierce glare 

Of distant fire, dashed as with blood, looms up 

Mantling the landskip ; while at intervals 

The sullen guns roar challenge to the heavens, 

And earth lies stricken — all her harmonies 

Turned to a hideous discord, mile on mile 

The trenched fields labour with their mortal freight — 

The sons of warring empires, over all 

Death's self, for ever present yet unseen, 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 275 

Broods like eclipse. But lo! amid the hush 
That falls upon the smoke-clad battle-zone, 
There rises, lull and sweet, from some dim copse 
Flanking the host, the same unfaltering note 
That haunts our English dingles far away — 
The cadence of a nightingale, whose song 
Goes floating through the gloom — one wild refrain 
Of deathless love and life's immortal hope. 

Edward Henry Blakeney 

402 

Ye barren peaks, so mightily outlined 

In naked rock against the viewless sky, 

Your rugged grandeur mocks my human pride, 
And rouses it to passionate reply. 

Ye scorn the foot that treads your pathless ways, 
The voice that breaks your primal solitudes. 

Yea, e'en the eye that views your serried heights, 
The ear that hears your canyon interludes. 

Yet know that when your music-making brooks 
Have buried you beneath the conquering sea, 

And mingled heart of stone with oozy mud. 
The topmost summit with the level lea. 

This ear shall hear the deathless song of Life, 
This eye shall see beyond the outmost skies. 

This voice shall sing soul-music, and this foot 
Shall tread the love-lit paths of Paradise. 

Should I, then, bom immortal, bow to you. 
Who are but transient mounds of earthly clod? 



276 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

glorious heights! — I kneel in humble awe 
To worship at the altars of my God. 

Bernard Freeman Trotter 

403 

^ Now have I left the world and all its tears, 

And high above the sunny cloud-banks fly, 

Alone in all this vast and lonely sky — 

This limpid space in which the myriad spheres 

Go thundering on, whose song God only hears 

High in his heavens. Ah! how small seem I, 

And yet I know he hears my little cry 

Down there among Mankind's cruel jests and sneers. 

And I forget the grief which I have known, 

And I forgive the mockers and their jest. 

And in this mighty solitude alone, 

I taste the joys of everlasting rest. 

Which I shall know when I have passed away 

To live in Heaven's never-fading day. 

Paul R. Bewsher 



404 

I may not wait to hear 
What says the wind that sweeps across the lea. 
And yet I know it speaks, and in its voice 
There is some word to make my heart rejoice, 
Some message speeding on eternally 

That God has not made clear. 

I may not wait to find 
The secret of the seething sea that flows 

1 Written while flying in the air. 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 277 

Nor ever rests; yet must there be some plan 
Above the most exalted thought of man, 
Some destiny that none but Heaven knows, 
And Heaven keeps me blind! 

I may not wait to know 
The secret of the towering mountain height 
That makes my little self so small and frail 
And bids me rest awhile behind the veil, 
Because so far beyond it shines the light 

And God would have it so! 

I may not wait; I see 
The hosts of Righteousness go forth to slay 
The armies of a people that would turn 
From all that makes man's nobler soul to burn, 
And yet I feel as now I take my way 

My Immortality! 

Reginald F, Clements 

405 

I that had life ere I was born 
Into this world of dark and light, 
Waking as one who wakes at mom 
From dreams of night, 

I am as old as Heaven and Earth — 
But sleep is death without decay, 
And since each morn renews my birth, 
I am no older than the day. 

Old though my outward form appears. 
Though it at last outworn shall lie. 



278 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

This, that is servile to the years, 
This is not I — 

I, who outwear the form 1 take, 
When I put off this garb of flesh, 
Still in immortal youth shall wake 
And somewhere clothe my life afresh. 

A. St. John Adcoch 

406 

And the leaves fall — 

The silver and golden fall together, 

A-mingled irresistibly like tears. 

The low-branched elms stand idly 

In all the full-leaved glory of their life: 

Yet here and there a yellow flake slips slowly. 

And the branch, where once it hung, lies bare. 

Below they lie — the yellow fruits of day. 

And a soft spirit of the night 

Weaves the white spell of sleep about their feet. 

And the leaves fall — 

The great sleep of the trees is nigh: 

The flowers are dead. 

Yet through the fine-spun web of mist 

Gleams faintly Michael's pale blue star — 

A time of sad soul-hunger, unspeakable desire, 

That clutches at the heart and drags the soul! 

And the leaves fall — 

Is there a far faint life 

Whispers with blood-choked voice thy name 



THE GRAIL OF LIFE 279 

Whispers but once — no more? 
Then weep ye now, Mothers! 
And, Maidens, weep! 

England, rend the raiment of thy wealth! 
Tear the soft vesture of thy pride! 
Let the tears fall and be not comforted! 
In all their youth they went for thee; 
In all their strength they died for thee; 
And so they fell. 
As the leaves fall — 

Yet they say you are dead? 

Ask of the trees. Perchance they hear 

A distant murmuring of pulsing sap. 

Perchance in their dim minds they see 

Pale curled leaves that strive to greet the sun, 

Perchance they know if yellow daffodils 

Will dance again. 

Yet the leaves fall — 

And yonder through the mist is Michael's star — 

Saint Michael with his angel -host! 

Ay! see them as they sweep along 

Borne on an unseen wind to the far throne of God. 

And, Mothers, see; Maidens, look 

How the world's Christ stoops down and kisses each. 

And listen now and hear their cry, 

As lances raised, they greet their King — 

" There is no death — There is no death — 

No death — " and comfort you 

When the leaves fall. 

Joseph Courtney 



280 THE GRAIL OF LIFE 

407 

Life! I know not what thou art, 
But I know that thou and I must part; 
And when, or how, or where we met 
I own to me's a secret yet. 

Life! we've been long together 
Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; 
'Tis hard to part when friends are dear — 
Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear; 
Then steal away, give little warning, 
Choose thine own time; 
Say not Good Night, — but in some brighter clime 
Bid me Good Morning. 

A, L, Barbauld 



APPENDIX 
A — SOURCES 

Sources from which quotations are taken, are listed herewith. In- 
asmuch as our purpose was to give inspiration rather than knowledge, 
we have eliminated all details, offering a minimum rather than a 
maximum of information. 

Some few quotations have been taken from trustworthy second- 
hand sources, which we have not thought it necessary to verify. 
Such cases are indicated by the word, Quoted. 

PART I 

1. — From Poem, Character of the Happy Warnor. 

2. — From Nichomachean Ethics. 

3. — Quoted, Bridges's The Spirit of Man. 

4. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 

5. — From The Trojan Women. 

6. — From The Seven Against Thebes. 

7. — The Courage of Enlightened Minos (480 B. c.) 

8. — Quoted, John Masefield's Gallipoli. 

9.— From History, II, 37, 
10. — From The Battle of the Baltic. 
11. — Ode, How Sleep the Brave. 
12.— From Childe Harold, III, 29. 
13. — Poem, Incident of the French Camp. 
14. — From An Ode Written in Time of Hesitation. (Referring to 

Robert Gould Shaw.) 
15. — From Memoriae Positum. (Referring to Shaw, as above.) 
16. — From Ode recited at the Harvard Commemoration, 1865. 
17. — Inscription (see footnote). 
18. — From Voluntaries. 
19. — From Above the Battle. 
20. — From Gallipoli. 
21. — Sonnet, Youth's Consecration, in Soldier Poets: Songs of the 

Fighting Men. 
22. — Sonnet, The Dead. 
23.— Sonnet, from 1914. 
24. — Poem, The Last Morning. 

25. — Same as No. 3. Published in the London Times (1914). 
26. — Sonnet, Death in France. 

281 



282 APPENDIX 

27. — Letter published in the New York TimeSy August, 1918. 

28. — From The American Spirit, a letter in France to his mother. 

29. — Poem, / Have a Rendezvous with Death. (Author killed in 

battle at Belloz-on-Sauterre, July, 1916.) 
30. — Poem, To a Hero. 
31. — Sonnet, To a Dead Poet. 

32. — Poem, Dirge for Dead Warriors, from Dies Heroica. 
33. — .Sonnet, To Our Dead. See Lest We Forget, A War Anthology. 
34. — Poem, Vimy Ridge. 
35. — Sonnet, Heroes. 
36. — Poem, The Morning Paper, from The Retinue and Other 

Poems. 
37. — Poem, Requiescant, from In the Battle Silences (written in a 

field near Ypres, April, 1915). 
38. — Poem, Adieu. 
39.— From The Wrack of the Storm. 
40. — From The Individual. 

41. — Quoted, John Morley's Recollections, voL ii 
42.—" Fragment." 
43. — From Essays: Of Death. 
44. — From A fax. 
45.— Sonnet XII. 
46. — Same as No. 41. 
47. — From Religio Medici. 
48. — Familiar quotation (unverified). 
49. — From Essay, Falsehood of Universal Peace. 
50. — Sonnet, Quern Metui Moritura. 
51. — Poem, Prospice. 
52. — From De Senectute. 
53. — From Julius Ccesar. 
54. — From The Map of Life. 
55. — From De Vita Beata, Chapter 22. 
56. — From Meditations. 
57.— From Ethics IV, 67. 
58. — From Discourses. 
59. — From The Economy of Human Life, translated from an Indian 

manuscript. 
60. — From Saemund's Edda. 

61. — Quoted, Moncure D. Conway's Sacred Anthology. 
62. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 
63. — Same as No. 61. 
64. — From The Imitation of Christ. 
65. — From Life of Channing, by his nephew William Henry Chan- 

ning, p. 612. 
66. — From Satires X, 357. 



APPENDIX 283 

67.— Poem, Shorter PoemSy Book III, No. 19. 

68. — From Aex Triplex. 

69. — From On William Shakespeare. 

70. — From Measure for Measure. 

71. — From contemporary newspaper account of the sinking of the 
Lusitania. 

72. — Poem, The Heroic Dead (on the loss of the Titanic) . 

73. — Poem, Sir Humphrey Gilbert. 

74. — Inscription written for the monument of Sir John Franklin in 
Westminster Abbey. 

75. — From Diary of Captain Scott, in Scott's Last Expedition, vol. i. 

76. — From Account of E. L. Atkinson, in Scott^s Last Expedition, 
vol. ii. 

77. — Last Statement of Captain Scott, in Scott's Last Expedition, 
vol. i. 

78. — Letter to Tacitus on the eruption of Vesuvius. 

79. — From Concerning the Statues. 

80. — From Samson Agonistes. 

81. — From On Belief in the Resurrection. 

82. — From A Tale of Two Cities. 

83. — From Androcles and the Lion. 

84.— Poem, The Last Word. 

85.— From The Private Life of the Buffs, 

86.— From Hellas, 211. 

87.— From The Task. 

88.— Poem, The Martyrs. 

89. — From Triumph. 

90. — From Apology of Socrates. 

91.— From Phaedo. 

92. — From the Apocrypha. 

93. — From the New Testament, a combination of Matthew and 
Luke. 

94. — From the New Testament. 

95. — From Revealed Religion, in The Grammar of Assent. 

96. — Same as No. 3 — Beatus Vincentuis. 

97. — From Foxe's Book of Martyrs. 

98. — Last words to judges at his trial for heresy. 

99. — Sonnet, Life Well Lost, in Warner's Library of World's Best 

Literature. 
100. — From Life of Savonarola. 
101. — Same as above. 
102.— Same as No. 97. 

103. — Letter to Friends (written in prison while awaiting execution) . 
104. — From Three Great Lives. 
105. — Same as No. 41. Quoted by Gladstone to Morley. 



284 APPENDIX 

106.— From Life of Sir Walter Raleigh (1736). 

107. — See footnote. 

108. — Letter to his wife after his condemnation (written in the Tower 
of London) . 

109. — Poem, My Pilgrimage. 

110. — From Article in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th edition. 

111. — The Martyrs' Monument (1706) Greyfriars Churchyard, Edin- 
burgh. 

112. — From Parkham's The Jesuits in North America. Written in 
anticipation of massacre by Huron Indians. 

113. — Letter from Ahmad Sohrab to the Friday night meeting at 
the studio of Miss Juliet Thompson, New York City, dated 
Port Said, Egypt, June, 1913 (hitherto unpublished). 

114. — From John Brown. 

115. — See quotation. 

116. — From Oswald Garrison Villard's Life of John Brown. 

117. — Speech before Judge Gary at trial of Chicago anarchists 
(1886). From contemporary newspaper account. 

118. — From Gilbert Murray's The War of Democracy. (Statement 
by Mr. Gahan.) 

119. — Editorial Karl Liebknecht. — From The Conservator^ March, 
1919. 

120.— From Paradise Lost, VI, 29. 

121.— From The City of God. 

122. — From Song of Myself. 

123. — From Chants Communal. 

124.— From Paine's Life of Mark Twain, HI. 1578. 

125.— Poem, Inscribed to " R. G. C. B.— 1878." 

126. — From Gitanjali, 91. 

127. — Same as above, 93. 

128. — From Poem, Habeas Corpus. 

129. — From Poem, Rcsurgam. 

130.— Poem, Let Me Live Out My Years. 

131. — Poem, Mors Benefica. 

132. — Poem, The Stirrup-Cup. 

133. — From The Cenci, Act V. 

134. — From Convito, quoted in Morley's Life of Gladstone. 

135. — From Life of Agricola, 45 and 46. 

136. — From Funeral Oration for Louis Bourbon, Prince of Conde. 

137. — From Thanatopsis. 

138.— Poem, A Wish. 

139. — From Memories of President Lincoln. — ""When Lilacs Last in 
the Door-yard Bloomed." 

140. — From Prayers of the Social Awakening. 



n 



APPENDIX 285 



PART II 

141.— Prayer to Sonia (Ry. IX, 113, 7). 

142. — Quoted, M. J. Savage's Minister's Handbook (China). 

143. — Same as above — (India) . 

144.— Same as No. 142— (200 B.C.). 

145. — Same as above — (1500 B. c.) . 

146.— Same as No. 142 — (2000 b. c.) . 

147.— Same as above— (2000 B.C.). 

14fi.— Same as No. 61. 

149.— Same as No. 142 — (589 b. c.) . 

150. — Same as No. 61. 

151. — From Electro. 

152.— From Iliad, XXIII — Pope's translation. 

153. — From Helen. 

154.— From The Republic. 

155. — From Metaphysics. 

156.— Same as No. 142— (500 B.C.). 

157. — Same as above — (580 B.C.). 

158.— From Phaedo. 

159. — From The Frogs. 

160. — From Myers' Pindar. 

161. — Same as No. 142, quoted by Cicero. 

162.— Same as No. 52. 

163. — Same as above. 

164. — Same as No. 55. 

165.— Same as No. 142. 

166. — Letter to his wife on the death of his little daughter. 

167. — Found in an ancient Greek Tomb. 

168. — Hon. Lionel A. Tollemache's translation. 

169. — From the Apocrypha. 

170. — From the New Testament, Gospel of John. 

171. — From the New Testament, I Corinthians. 

172. — From On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain, 

173. — The Hymn to Apollo. 

174. — From On Belief in the Resurrection. 

175. — From On the Decease of Satyrus. 

176. — Consolatory letter to Heliodorus on the death of his nephew, 

Nepotian. 
177. — Same as No. 3. — Iste Cognovit. 
178. — From The Acts of the Apostles. 
179. — From Nisibene Hymns. 
180.— Same as No. 142. 
181. — From The Great Catechism. 



286 APPENDIX 

182. — From The Divine Institutes. 

183. — From Against the Gentiles. 

184. — From Monologium LXIX. 

185. — Same as No. 3 — Gaudent in caelis, 

186. — Same as above — Sanctum est. 

187. — From Select Demonstrations. 

188.— Same as No. 121. 

189.— From The Vesper Hymn. 

190. — From Meditations. -"■' 

191.— Same as No. 64. 

192. — Compilation from (1) The Forty Questions of the Soul, (2) 
The Way of Christ, and (3) Aurora. 

193. — From Works drawn from obscurity in middle of last century 
by Franz Pfeiffer (1857). — Rich collection, eighteen trea- 
tises, translated by Sister Odilia Funke. 

194. — From Opuscules. 

195. — Letter to his sister on the death of their father. 

196. — From Immortality of the Soul (Conversation with M. de 
Ramsai) . 

197. — From Spiritual Torrents. 

198.— Letter to " Child of God soon to die." 

199.— Canzone VIII. 

200. — Sonnet, To Laura. 

201. — Same as above. 

202. — From The Divine Comedy (Paradiso). 

203. — Sonnet, Love and Death. 

204. — Sonnet, Lovers Furnace. 

205.— From Morals. 

206. — From Philosophical Maxims. 

207, — From Christian Theology. 

208. — From The Resurrection. 

209.— Poem, Astro phel (Sir Philip Sidney). 

210. — From A Confession of Faith. 

211.— From Journal (the 6th of the 11th month, 1687). 

212. — From Pilgrim's Progress. 

213. — From Lycidas. 

214. — From Paradise Lost. 

215. — From Sonnet. 

216. — From The Analogy of Religion. 

217.— From Holy Living and Holy Dying. 

218.— Same as No. 47. 

219. — From Of the Truth of the Christian Religion, 

220. — From The Spectator. 

221.— From Principia, Bk. III. 

222.— From Ethics. 



APPENDIX 287 

223. — From The Reasonableness of Christianity. 

224. — From Critique of Locke on " Human Understanding" 

225. — From Pensees Diverses. 

226. — From The True Christian Religion. 

227. — From Heaven and Hell. 

228. — From On the Understanding. 

229.— From Cato, Act V, Scene I. 

230. — Poem, Our Life Is Hid with Christ in God, in The Temple. 

231.— Poem, The Dying Christian to His Soul. 

232. — Poem, Friends in Paradise. 

233.— From Poem, On Receipt of My Mother's Picture. 

234. — Hymn, from The Seasons. 

235.— Same as No. 142. 

236.— From Night Thoughts, Bk. I. 

237.— From The Task. 

238. — From The Critique of Practical Reason. 

239.— Compilation from (1) The Ignorant Philosopher, and (2) 
Essay on Soul. 

240. — From Emile (the "Savoyard Vicar"). 

241. — From Journal, in Lockhart's Life of Scott, vol. vii. 

242.— From Pleasures of Hope, Bk. II. 

243. — From Maxims. 

244.— Quoted, J. F. Clarke's Go Up Higher (Sermon, "Many Man- 
sions"). 

245. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 

246.— Same as No. 243. 

247.— Same as No. 142. 

248. — From Age of Reason. 

249. — Epitaph written by himself. 

250. — Quoted, R. W. Emerson's essay on Immortality. 

251. — From Directions of a Blessed Life. 

252. — Letter to John Adams, on the death of Mrs. Adams. 

253. — From Lectures on the True, the Beautiful and the Good, XVI. 

254. — From Philosophy of Life and Philosophy of Language, Lec- 
ture IV. 

255. — From Queen Mah. 

256.— Poem, The Death Bed. 

257. — From Prometheus Unbound, Act III, Scene 3. 

258. — Poem, Adonais. 

259.— Same as No. 243. 

260. — From Religious Musings. 

261. — From To a Friend. 

262. — Poem, When Coldness Wraps this Suffering Clay. 

263. — Ode, Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early 
Childhood. 



288 APPENDIX 

264. — From The Excursion. 

265. — Poem, The Journey of Life. 

266.— Sonnet, Night. 

267. — From Immortality (a sermon). 

268. — From The Philosophy of Religion. 

269. — From essay on Immortality. 

270. — From an essay (miverified). 

271. — From A Sermon on Immortal Life. 

272. — From Meditations on the Immortality of the Soul. 

273.— From Threnody. 

274. — From Sartor Resartus. 

275. — Poem, No Coward Soul is Mine. 

276.— From Festus. 

277.— From Three Nuns. 

278.— From To the End. 

279.— From The Blessed Damozel. 

280. — From The Dream of Gerontius. 

281. — From a sermon (miverified). 

282. — From Letters. 

283. — From Poem, Peach-Blossom. 

284. — From Resignation. 

285. — From On the Death of a Friend's Child. 

286. — Letter to his wife on the death of her brother, in Life by 
Julian Hawthorne. 

287. — From The Eternal Goodness. 

288. — From Snowbound. 

289. — Poem, The Chambered Nautilus. 

290.— Same as No. 142. 

291. — Letter written in anticipation of death. 

292.— From Best Thoughts. 

293. — Letter to step-brother, John Johnson, referring to his dying 
father, quoted in "William Eleroy Curtis's The True Abra- 
ham Lincoln. 

294i. — Remarks at the funeral service of Mrs. William Lloyd Garri- 
son, Jan. 27, 1876. 

295. — From Where the Light Dwelleth, sermon "Looking Toward 
Sunset." 

296. — From Essentials and Non-Essentials in Religion. 

297. — From Sermons. 

298. — From Endeavors After the Christian Life (sermon " Great 
Hopes"). 

299.— Poem, After Death in Arabia. 

300. — From Paracelsus. 

301. — From Death of the Duke of Clarence. 

302.— From The Ring and the Book (" Pompilia"). 



APPENDIX 289 

303. — From Sonnet, Immortality. 

304. — Poem, Through a Glass Darkly. 

305.— From The Future. 

306. — Poem, Crossing the Bar. 

307. — Sonnet, The Prospect. 

308.— From Les Miserables (" Fantine ") . 

309. — From Journal. 

310. — From Philosophic Dialogues and Fragments. 

311. — From The Fundamental Ideas of Christianity (" The Future 
Life"). 

312. — From Microcosmos: An Essay Concerning Man and His Rela- 
tion to the World. 

313. — From Address. 

314. — From Gleanings of Past Years, Vol. III. 

315. — From Three Essays on Religion: Theism. 

316. — From Life by his Son, Vol. I. 

317. — From Miracles and Modern Spiritualism. 

318. — From The Destiny of Man. 

319. — From Evolution and Its Relation to Religious Thought. 

320.— Same as No. 40. 

321. — Poem, Evolution. 

322. — From Letters (to his niece, Mrs. Deacon) . 

323. — From Poem, Gods. 

324. — From a sermon (unverified). 

325. — From Progress and Poverty. 

326. — From The Brothers Karamazof. 

327.— From B.eply to the Holy Synod (1901). 

328. — From Science and Immortality. 

329. — From Joseph Vance. 

330. — From Continuity, an address as President of the British Asso- 
ciation, 1913. 

331. — Poem, The Open Door, in The New Morning. 

332. — Poem, Faith, in Poems. 

333. — Poem, Love and Death. 

334. — From The Small End of Great Problems. 

335. — From Life Beyond Death. 

336.— Same as No. 140. 

337. — From Immortality and the New Theodicy. 

338. — From Human Immortality. 

339.— From Paine's Life of Mark Twain, Vol. Ill, 1431. 

340.— From The Silent Isle. 

341. — From The Measure of the Hours. 

342. — From On the Threshold of the Unseen. 

343.— Tablet to Ra'is. 

344. — From The Truth of Religion. 



290 APPENDIX 

345. — From The New Theology. 

346. — From An Essay in Discovery ("The Mind and the Brain"). 

347. — Same as above ("The Resurrection of the Dead"). 

348. — From Notebook (unpublished). 

349. — From The World and the Individual, Vol. II. 

350. — From Can We Believe in Immortality? 

351. — From The Immortality of the Soul. 

352. — From Creative Evolution, III. 

353. — From The Endless Life. 

354. — From Faith in a Future Life. 

355. — From The Assurance of Immortality. 

356. — From The Drew Lecture, delivered at Oxford, Oct. 11, 1912. 

357. — From Love, Home and the Inner Life. 

358. — From The Drama of Love and Death. 

359. — From Religion and Immortality, Chap. 4. 

360. — Compilation from (1) The Patrician, (2) A Sheaf, (3) Free- 
lands, (4) The Inn of Tranquillity, and (4) A Bit o' Love, 
made originally for Readings from Great Authors. 

361. — From Gitanjali, 95. 

362.— From War and Peace, Vol. II. 

363. — Poem, The Hope of the Resurrection, in The Congo. 

364. — Poem, At a Burial, in New Poems. 

365. — Poem, Non Sine Dolore. 

366. — From Hymn to the Sea. 

367. — From Liberty and Literature. 

368. — Poem, Requiem. 

369.— From The Well by the Way. 

370. — Poem, The Journey. 

371. — Poem, The Pilgrim, in The Shoes of Happiness. 

372. — From Passage to India. 

373. — Poem, Joy, Shipmate, Joy! 

374. — From Towards Democracy. 

375. — Poem, The Assault by Night. 

376. — Poem, Birth and Death. 

377.— From Life After Death. 

378. — From Peter Ibbetson. 

379.— Same as No. 346 (" A Dream of Heaven "). 

380. — Sonnet, Suggested by Some Proceedings of the Society for 
Psychical Research. 

381. — Poem, When Earth's Last Picture, in Collected Verse. 

382. — Song, from Tales of the Mermaid Tavern. 

383. — Poem, To Bayard Taylor. 

384 — Sonnet, Call me not dead — 

385. — Letter in the Liberator, in memory of Miss Jessie Ashley. 

386. — From By the Fireside. 



APPENDIX 291 

387. — From Jean Christophe, Vol. IX. 

388. — Poem, Home At Last. 

389.— Sonnet, from 1914. 

390. — Sonnet, Rupert Brooke. 

391. — Sonnet, Rupert Brooke, in Battle and Other Poems. 

392.— Sonnet, To W. H. W. 

393.— Sonnet, To Julian Grenfell. 

394. — Sonnet, To the Men Who Have Died for England. Printed in 

Punch. 
395. — Poem, By Yser Banks (An elegy on a young officer). 
396. — Sonnet, The Inward Clarion, from The Poetry Review. 
397. — Sonnet, Our Dead, in Ardours and Endurances. 
398. — Poem, Killed in Action. 
399. — Poem, Real Presence, in The Poetry Review. 
4m.— Two Sonnets, "To Death!" See Clarke's Treasury of War 

Poetry. 
401. — Poem, In View of the Battlefield, in Collected War Poems. 
402. — Poem, Altars, in A Canadian Twilight and Other Poems of 

War and of Peace. (Author killed in action, 1917.) 
403. — Sonnet, The Fringe of Heaven, in The Dawn Patrol and Other 

Poems of an Aviator. 
404. — Poem, Immortality. 

405.^ Poem, Immortality, in Songs of the World War. 
406. — Poem, As the Leaves Fall, in Soldier Poets: Songs of the 

Fighting Men. 
407. — Poem, Life! I know not what thou art. 



APPENDIX 
B — ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 

Copyrighted material has been included in this Anthology by per- 
mission of, and by special arrangement with, publishers and authors. 
Thanks are herewith extended to the following who have thus co- 
operated with us in the making of this book: 

Allen and Unwin, Ltd., London: 

Edward Carpenter, Towards Democracy, 

Cartwright Frith, " Heroes." 
Appleton & Co., New York: 

Alfred W. Martin, Faith in a Future Life, 

Nathaniel Shaler, The Individual. 
Atlantic Monthly Press, Boston: 

Briggs Adams, The American Spirit. 
Ball Publishing Company, Boston: 

Sir Oliver Lodge, The Immortality of the Soul, 
Blackwell, D. H., Oxford: 

R. Fanshawe, " By Yser Bank." 
Blakeney, E. H., Kings School, Ely, "In View of the Battlefield," 

from Collected War Poems. 
Brentano's : 

G. Bernard Shaw, " Androcles and the Lion." 
Cecil Palmer and Hayward, London : 

A. St. John Adcock, " Immortality." 
Chatto and Windus, London: 

Robert Nichols, Ardours and Endurances. 
Child, Oscar C. A., " To a Hero." 
Constable and Co., London: 

F. G. Scott, In the Battle Silences. 
De Beauvoir, Dr. W. E., " Killed in Action." 
Dodd, Mead & Company, New York: 

Maurice Maeterlinck, The Measure of the HourSy The Wrack of 
the Storm. 

Robert F. Scott, Scott's Last Expedition. 
Doran and Company, New York: 

John Oxenham, *' Vimy Ridge." 
292 



APPENDIX 293 

Doubleday, Page & Company, New York: 

Rudyard Kipling, Collected Verse. 

Edwin Markham, The Shoes of Happiness. 

Charles Wagner, By the Fireside. 
Dryden Publishing Company, New York: 

(A Soldier Son), "Adieu." 
Dutton and Company, New York: 

Katherine Lee Bates, The Retinue and Other Poems (1918). 

Sir William F. Barrett, On the Threshold of the Unseen 
(1918). 
Erskine Macdonald, Ltd., London: 

Paul R. Bewsher, The Dawn Patrol. 

J. N. Streets, The Undying Splendor, 
Fifield (A. C), London: 

Elizabeth Gibson, The Well by the Way, 
Fortnightly Review, England: 

W. L. Courtney, " To Our Dead." 
Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York: 

Arthur Gleason, Love, Home and the Inner Life. 

Alfred Noyes, Tales of the Mermaid Tavern, " The Heroic Dead," 
"The Open Door." 
George W. Jacobs and Company, Philadelphia: 

W. E. B. DuBois, John Brown. 
Harper Brothers, New York: 

George Du Maurier, Peter Ihbetson. 

A. B. Paine, Life of Mark Twain. 

R. H. Stoddard, " Hymn to the Sea," 
Henry Holt and Company, New York: 

Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution. 

William De Morgan, Joseph Vance. 

Romain Rolland, Jean Christophe. 
Houghton, MiflBin and Company, Boston: 

G. H. Clarke (ed.), Treasury of War Poetry, 

S. M. Crothers, The Endless Life. 

John Fiske, The Destiny of Man. 

R. W. Gilder, "Love and Death," "Non Sine Dolore," " CaU Me 
Not Dead." 

G. A. Gordon, Immortality and the New Theodicy, 

William James, Human Immortality. 

J. R. Lowell, " Commemoration Ode," " Memoriae Positum," 
" On the Death of a Friend's Child." 

W. V. Moody, " Ode in Time of Hesitation." 

William Osier, " Science and Immortality." 

E. C. Stedman, " Assault by Night," " Mors Benefica." 

O. G. ViUard, Life of John Brown, 



294 



APPENDIX 



John Lane Company, New York: 

Rupert Brooke, Sonnets " 1914," " Suggested by Proceedings of 
the Society for Psychical Research." 

WiUiam Watson, " At a Burial," " Birth." 
Little, Brown and Company, Boston: 

Emily Dickinson, Poems (Second Series). 

Francis Parkman, The Jesuits in North America. 
McClelland, Goodchild and Stewart, Toronto: 

B. F. Trotter, A Canadian Twilight. 
McClurg and Company, Chicago: 

William Clark, Life of Savonarola. 
Maclechose and Company, England: 

Edward Caird, Address. 
MacmiUan Company, New York: 

Matthew Arnold, "The Future," "A Wish," "Immortality," 
" The Last Word." 

R. G. Campbell, The New Theology. 

A. H. Clough, " Through a Glass Darkly." 

Harry E. Fosdick, The Assurance of Immortality, 

W. W, Gibson, Battle and Other Poems. 

Vachel Lindsay, The Congo. 

John Masefield, Philip the King, Gallipoli. 

J. G. Neihardt, " Let Me Live Out My Years." 

Stephen Phillips, " Faith." 

Josiah Royce, The World and the Individual. 

Rabindranath Tagore, Gitanjali. 

An Essay in Discovery (Symposium). 
Mitchell Kennerley, New York: 

Edward Carpenter, The Drama of Love and Death. 
North American Review, New York: 

Alan Seegar, " I Have a Rendezvous with Death." 
Open Court Company, Chicago: 

Remain RoUand, Above the Battle. 
Oxford University Press, England: 

Robert Bridges, " Youth Whose Hope Is High." 
Pilgrim Press, Boston: 

Walter Rauschenbusch, Prayers of the Social Awakening. 
Poetry Review, Chicago: 

Ivan Adair, " Real Presence." 

N. B. Nichols, " The Inward Clarion." 
Punch, London: 

Anonymous, "To the Men Who Have Died for England." 
Putnam and Sons, New York: 

A. C. Benson, The Silent Isle. 

Sir Oliver Lodge, Continuity. 



APPENDIX 295 

Rudolph Eucken, The Truth of Religion, 

M. J. Savage, Life Beyond Death. 
Scribner's Sons, New York: 

John Galsworthy, The Patricians, Inn of Tranquillity, A Sheaf, 
A Bit o' Love. 

William Henley, " The Ways of Death." 

Sidney Lanier, " The Stirrup Cup," " To Bayard Taylor." 

R. L. Stevenson, " Aex Triplex." 
Small, Maynard and Company, Boston: 

Father Tabb, " Evolution." 



INDEX 



[The figures in this Index refer to selection numbers] 



Abdul Baha, 113 

Abelard, 189 

Acts of the Apostles, 94 

Adair, Ivan, 399 

Adams, Briggs, 28 

Adcock, A. St. John, 405 

Addison, Joseph, 220, 229 

Aeschylus, 6 

Agricola, 135 

Alcott, J. Bronson, 270 

Ambrose, St., 81, 174, 175 

Amiel, Henri Frederick, 309 

Angelo, Michael, 62, 203, 204 

Anonymous, 25, 27, 38, 394 

Anselm, St., 184 

Aphrahat, 187 

Apocrypha, The, 92, 169 

Aristophanes, 159 

Aristotle, 2, 155 

Arnold, Matthew, 84, 138, 303, 

305 
Arnold, Sir Edwin, 299 
Athanasius, St., 183 
Atkinson, E. L., 76 
Augustine, St., 121, 188 
Aurelius, Marcus, 56 



Bernard, St., 190 
Bewsher, Paul R., 403 
Bhagavadgita, 63, 144 
Bible, The, 93, 94, 170, 171 
Blakeney, Edward Henry, 401 
Boehme, Jakob, 192 
Bossuet, James Benique, 136 
Brebeuf, Jean de, 112 
Bridges, Robert, 67 
Bronte, Emily, 275 
Brooke, Rupert, 22, 23, 380, 389 
Brooks, Phillips, 324 
Brown, Crommelin, 32, 390 
Brown, John, 114, 115, 116 
Brown, Sir Thomas, 47, 218 
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 307 
Browning, Robert, 13, 51, 300, 

302 
Brunitiere, M., 49 
Bruno, Giordano, 98, 99 
Bryant, WiUiam CuUen, 137, 265 
Buddha, 148 

Buddhist Scriptures, 142, 143 
Bunyan, John, 212 
Butler, Bishop, 216 
Byron, Lord, 12, 262 



Bacon, Sir Francis, 43, 210 
Baha O'Llah, 343 
Bailey, Philip James, 276 
Barbauld, Mrs. A. L., 407 
Barrett, Sir William F., 342 
Bates, Katherine Lee, 36 
Beecher, Henry Ward, 292 
Bellows, Henry W., 297 
Benson, Arthur Christopher, 
Bergson, Henri, 352 



340 



Caird, Edward, 313 
Caird, John, 311 
Calvin, John, 207 
Campbell, Thomas, 10, 242 
Campbell, Reginald J., 345 
Carlyle, Thomas, 274 
Carpenter, Edward, 358, 374 
Carstairs, CarroU, 26 
Cato, 161 
Cavell, Edith, 118 



297 



298 



INDEX 



Channing, William Ellery, 65, 

267 
Chesterton, Gilbert K., 388 
Child, Oscar C. A., 30 
CLrysostom, St. John, 79, 178 
Church Service, The, 96, 177, 

185, 186 
Cicero, 52, 162, 163 
Clark, William, 100 
Clarke, James Freeman, 296 
Clements, Reginald F., 404 
Clough, Arthur Hugh, 304 
Clutton-Brock, A., 379 
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 260 
Collier, Jeremy, 105 
Collins, William, 11 
Collyer, Robert, 295 
Cooke, Francis E., 104 
Corinthians (I), 171 
Courtney, Joseph, 406 
Courtney, W. L., 33 
Cousin, M. Victor, 253 
Cowper, William, 87, 233, 237 
Cranmer, Archbishop, 105 
Crothers, Samuel McChord, 353 

Dante, 134, 202 
Darwin, Charles, 316 
Da Vmci, Leonardo, 205, 206 
De Beauvoir, W. Evans, 398 
De Morgan, William, 329 
Dickens, Charles, 82 
Dickinson, Emily, 88, 89, 370 
Dickinson, G. Lowes, 359 
Donne, John, 215 
Dostoevsky, 326 
Doyle, Sir F. H., 85 
Du Bois, W. E. B., 114 
Du Maurier, George, 378 



Ephraim Syrus, 179 
Epictetus, 58 

Epitaph (Egyptian Tomb), 147 
Epitaph (Greek Tomb), 167 
Epitaph (Greyfriars Churchyard, 

Edinburgh), 111 
Eucken, Rudolph, 344 
Euripides, 5, 153 

Fanshawe, R., 395 

Faraday, Michael, 322 

Fechner, Gustav, 377 

Fenelon, 196 

Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 251 

Fiske, John, 318 

Fosdick, Harry Emerson, 355 

Fox, George, 211 

Foxe (Book of Martyrs), 97, 102 

Franklin, Benjamin, 249, 250 

Frith, J. Cartwright, 35 

Frohman, Charles, 71 

Galsworthy, John, 360 

George, Henry, 325 

Gibson, Elizabeth, 369 

Gibson, W. W., 391 

Gilder, Richard Watson, 333, 

365, 384 
Giovannitti, Arturo, 385 
Gladstone, William E., 314 
Gleason, Arthur, 357 
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang, 244 
Gordon, George A., 337 
Gospels, The, 93, 170 
Greek Anthology, 168 
Gregory of Nyssa, 180, 181 
Grotius, Hugo, 219 
Guizot, F. P. G., 272 
Guyon, Madame, 197, 198 



Eckhart, Meister, 193 
Egyptian Book of the Dead, 146 
Elizabeth, Queen, 46 
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 17, 18, 
269, 273 



Hadfield, James Arthur, 346 
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 286 
Hegel, George Wilhelm Fried- 
rich, 268 
Henley, William K, 125 



INDEX 



299 



Heraclitus, 156 

Herbert, George, 230 

Herder, Johann Gottfried von, 

235 
Herford, Brooke, 334 
Hindus, 141 

Holmes, Oliver WendeU, 289 
Homer, 152 
Hood, Thomas, 256 
Hugo, Victor, 69, 308 
Hume, David, 228 
Huss, John, 103 

Indian MS., 59 
IngersoU, Robert G., 367 

Jackson, Helen Hunt, 128, 129 
James, William, 338 
JeflFerson, Thomas, 252 
Jerome, St., 176 
Jesus, 93, 170 
Juvenal, 66 

Kant, Immanuel, 48, 238 
Kempis, Thomas a, 64, 191 
Kheyam, Omar, 61 
King, Starr, 290 
Kingsley, Charles, 281 
Kipling, Rudyard, 381 
Knox, John, 208 

Lactantius, 182 

Lanier, Sidney, 132, 383 

Latimer, Hugh, 110 

Lecky, W. E. H„ 54 

Le Conte, Joseph, 319 

Leibnitz, Gottfried Wilhelm 

von, 224 
Liebknecht, Karl, 119 
Lincoln, Abraham, 293 
Lindsay, Vachel, 363 
Litt, R. H. C. D., 356 
Lloyd, Henry Demarest, 348 
Locke, John, 223 
Lodge, Sir Oliver, 330, 351 



V Longfellow, Henry W., 73, 284 
Lotze, Herman, 312 
Lowell, James RusseU, 15, 16 
285 

Maccabees (I), 92 
./Maeterlinck, Maurice, 39, 341 
Markham, Edwin, 371 
Martin, Alfred, 354 
Martineau, James, 298 
Masefield, John, 20 
M. B., 393 

Mill, John Stuart, 315 
Milton, John, 80, 120, 213, 214 
Mohammed, 4, 150 
Montesquieu, 225 
Moody, William Vaughn, 14 
More, Sir Thomas, 104 

Neihardt, John G., 130 
Newman, John Henry, 95, 280 
Newton, Isaac, 221 
Nichols, Robert, 24, 397 
Nichols, Wallace Bertram, 396 
Noyes, Alfred, 72, 331, 382 

Oldys, William, 106 
Osier, William, 328 
Oxenham, John, 34 

Paine, Thomas, 247, 248 
Parker, Theodore, 271 
Pascal, 194, 195 
Paul, 171 

Petrarch, 199, 200, 201 
Phillips, Stephen, 332 
Phillips, Wendell, 294 
Philo, 172 
Pindar, 160 
Plato, 90, 91, 154, 158 
Pliny the Younger, 78 
Plotinus, 173 
Plutarch, 165, 166 
Pope, Alexander, 231 
Pythagoras, 157 



300 



INDEX 



Raleigh, Sir Walter, 106, 107, 

108, 109 
Rauschenbusch, "Walter, 140, 336 
Renan, Ernest, 310 
Richter, Jean Paul, 243, 246, 259 
Robertson, Frederick, 282 
Roland, Song of, 8 
RoUand, Romain, 19, 387 
Rossetti, Christina, 277, 278 
Rossetti, Dante G., 279 
Rousseau, J. J., 240 
Royce, Josiah, 349 

Saemund, 60 

Savage, Minot J., 335 

Savonarola, 101 

Schlegel, Frederick von, 254 

Scott, Capt. Robert F., 75, 77 

Scott, Frederick George, 37 

Scott, Sir Walter, 241 

Seegar, Alan, 29 

Seneca, 55, 164 

Shakespeare, William, 45, 53, 70 

Shaler, Nathaniel, 40, 320 

Shaw, G. Bernard, 83 

Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 86, 133, 

255, 257, 258 
Sill, Edward Rowland, 50 
Simonides of Ceos, 7 
Snowden, James H., 350 
Socrates (see Plato) 
Sophocles, 42, 44, 151 
Sorley, Charles Hamilton, 400 
Southey, Robert, 261 
Spenser, Edmund, 209 
Spies, August, 117 
Spinoza, 57, 222 
Stedman, E. C, 131, 375 
Stephen, St., 94 
Stevenson, Robert Louis, 68, 368 



Stoddard, Richard Henry, 366 
Stowe, Harriett Beecher, 291 
Streeter, Burnett Hillman, 347 
Streets, J. N., 21, 31, 392 
Swedenborg, Emanuel, 226, 227 

Tabb, John B., 321 

Tacitus, 135 

Tagore, Rabindranath, 126, 127, 

361 
Tamil, South Indian Book of 

Poems, 3 
Taylor, Bayard, 283 
Taylor, Jeremy, 217 
-J Tennyson, Alfred, 74, 301, 306 
Thomson, James, 234 
Thucydides, 9 
Tolstoi, Leo, 327, 362 
Traubel, Horace, 119, 123 
Trotter, Bernard Freeman, 402 
Twain, Mark, 124, 339 

Vane, Sir Henry, 41 
Vaughan, H., 232 
Vedas, 145 
Voltaire, 239 

Wagner, Charles, 386 
Wallace, Alfred Russel, 317 
Watson, William, 364, 376 
White, Blanco, 266 
Whittier, John Greenleaf, 287, 

288 
Whitman, Walt, 122, 139, 323, 

372, 373 
Wisdom of Solomon, The, 169 
Wordsworth, William, 1, 263, 264 

Young, Edward, 236 

Zoroaster, 149 









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